PhD Fellowship: Software Engineering Foundations for LLM-Enabled Agentic Systems
Deadline: 13.04.2026
Publisert
Kristiania University of Applied Sciences offers study programs in management, organization, marketing, communication, computer science, information technology, health sciences, innovation and creative arts. Kristiania University of Applied Sciences is Norway's largest independent comprehensive university college with its 24,000 students and a large education offering in Oslo, Bergen and online. Our mission is to strongly contribute to the country's social and economic development through problem-driven and applied knowledge development and dissemination, in close cooperation with society at large.
PhD Fellowship in Applied Information Technology: Software Engineering Foundations for LLM-Enabled Agentic Systems
The School of Economics, Innovation, and Technology
The School of Economics, Innovation, and Technology delivers research and study programmes at bachelor and master level. The emphasis for both research and study programmes is on economics, innovation, digitalization and information technology. Information science, information systems and the interaction between technology and human beings are other exciting focus areas. We also have our own PhD programme in Applied Information Technology. The department is expanding its online offers and offers in further and continuing education in cooperation with working life. The department has well-established research groups and research labs at a high international level.
About the position
Kristiania University of Applied Sciences is offering a fully funded PhD fellowship in Applied Information Technology. The successful applicant will be included in a team of researchers with ambitious plans to further develop research and pedagogical activities related to Applied Information Technology at the university.
The PhD project should aim to establish software engineering foundations for LLM-enabled agentic systems including architecture, assurance, and operations.
The candidate will:
Define architecture and design patterns (planner–executor–critic, retrieval-first/tool-first, escalation trees) with selection guidelines and anti-patterns
Introduce specification and guardrailing mechanisms (schema/contract DSLs, policy-aware tool use, pre/postconditions) that prevent tool misuse and unsafe actions
Develop testing methods for non-deterministic multi-step workflows (unit tests for tools, scenario tests for plans, metamorphic and differential oracles, agent fuzzing)
Engineer configuration policies for accuracy–latency–energy trade-offs (routing, budget caps, early-exit) with quantitative evaluation on canonical software engineering tasks (code generation/repair, log analysis, vulnerability triage)
The outcome will be a validated pattern catalog, a spec/guard toolkit, an agent test harness with coverage metrics, an open telemetry schema + replay tool, and a public benchmark with multi-objective metrics (accuracy, robustness, safety, latency, energy/CO₂), released as open-source artifacts and demonstrated in at least one industry-grade case study.
The candidates must have:
Master’s degree (120 ECTS or equivalent) in a relevant subject area with a grade B or better on the master’s thesis and for the master’s degree overall. The master’s thesis must be a minimum of 30 ECTS or equivalent. The relevance of the subject areas is dependent on the type of project proposed by the candidate
Relevant 180 ECTS bachelor’s degree
Solid software engineering skills (clean architecture, testing, version control, CI/CD)
Strong programming in Python (and comfort with TypeScript/Java helpful)
Practical experience with modern ML/LLM stacks (PyTorch/Transformers and at least one agent framework such as LangGraph/AutoGen/LangChain)
Basic statistics/experimental design
Analytical thinking and enthusiasm for interdisciplinary research
Proficiency in both written and spoken English (interviews and all communication will be in English)
Ideally, candidates should have:
Competence in empirical evaluation and reproducible research (experiment design, statistics, benchmarking)
Familiarity with MLOps (containers, orchestration, monitoring), cloud/GPUs
Exposure to security/compliance (GDPR/AI Act), energy/latency measurement, or IoT/digital twins
Personal qualities:
Curiosity and a strong motivation to carry out independent interdisciplinary research
Good communication and cooperation skills
The ability, desire and capacity to work independently, systematically, and purposefully
Orientation toward the completion of projects and the attainment of goals
Emphasis will be placed on personal suitability for the position.
Benefits:
High salary compared to international standards (NOK 550,800 per year)
Equipment at your disposal during employment (e.g., high-end laptop, mobile and mobile subscription)
NOK 50,000 per year to support travel to conferences and other running costs
Free health insurance, travel insurance, and pension plan
Strong labour laws (e.g., fully paid parental and sick leaves, 25 paid days of vacation and paid sick leave)
The application must include:
Motivation letter for the position
Approved diplomas and transcripts (in Scandinavian or English language)
CV
At least two references
Master’s thesis
A project proposal of up to 4 pages (max. 2,000 words, excluding references), written in English, outlining the candidate’s intended PhD research in relation to the described PhD project, including background, relevant literature, objectives, methods and expected contributions
Admission to the PhD programme is a requirement for taking up a position as a research fellow. The application must be submitted to the School of Doctoral Studies within three months of the start date. For more information, see the Regulations relating to conditions of appointment for research fellowships: https://lovdata.no/forskrift/2024-06-28-1392/§3-19.
The PhD fellowship period is 3 years, and the earliest start date is 01.09.2026.
Working place is the School of Economics, Innovation, and Technology. The school is located in Oslo, with numerous amenities, recreational spaces and urban fun right next door.
Kristiania University of Applied Sciences welcomes and encourages applications from diverse backgrounds. Women and persons with minority background are particularly encouraged to apply.
For more information about Kristiania, visit here.
To learn more about the PhD in Applied Information Technology, visit here.
Application deadline: 13.04.2026.
Only applications received through our application portal will be considered.
Please note that all educational credentials and certificates will be thoroughly verified as part of the recruitment process.
We use Semac background checks in our recruitment process.
The employment is to be made in accordance with the regulation to Control of the Export of Strategic Goods, Services and Technology. Candidates who, by assessment of the application and attachments, are seen to conflict with the criteria in the latter law will be prohibited from recruitment to Kristiania.
