Phd Position F/m Ai-based Embedded Real-time Audio Dsp

Le descriptif de l’offre ci-dessous est en Anglais_

**Type de contrat**: CDD

**Niveau de diplôme exigé**: Bac + 5 ou équivalent

**Fonction**: Doctorant

**A propos du centre ou de la direction fonctionnelle**:
The Inria research centre in Lyon is the 9th Inria research centre, formally created in January 2022. It brings together approximately 300 people in 19 research teams and research support services.

Its staff are distributed at this stage on 2 campuses: in Villeurbanne La Doua (Centre / INSA Lyon / UCBL) on the one hand, and Lyon Gerland (ENS de Lyon) on the other.

The Lyon centre is active in the fields of software, distributed and high-performance computing, embedded systems, quantum computing and privacy in the digital world, but also in digital health and computational biology.

**Contexte et atouts du poste**:
**Mission confiée**:
**PhD Topic**

In this context, the goal of this PhD is to take a multifaceted approach towards delivering new solutions for cutting-edge AI-based embedded real-time audio DSP with frugality and accessibility on mind. For that, several paths will be explored, relying on emerging programmable embedded architectures such as embedded Neural Processing Units - NPUs (i.e., ARM Ethos-U, STM32N6, etc.), smartphones, and custom architectures for AI-based real-time audio DSP relying on FPGAs (Field-Programmable Gate Arrays).

**References**

[1] Gregorio Giudici, Franco Caspe, Leonardo Gabrielli, Stefano Squartini, and Luca Turchet. Distilling DDSP: Exploring real-time audio generation on embedded systems. Journal of the Audio Engineering Society, 73:331-345, 06 2025.
[2] Jason Hoopes, Brooke Chalmers, and Victor Zappi. Neural audio processing on android phones. In Proceedings of the 2024 International Conference on Digital Audio Effects, 2024.
[3] Malek Itani, Tuochao Chen, Arun Raghavan, Gavriel Kohlberg, and Shyamnath Gollakota. Wireless hearables with programmable speech AI accelerators. arXiv preprint arXiv:2503.18698, 2025.
[4] Andrew P McPherson, Robert H Jack, and Giulio Moro. Action-sound latency: Are our tools fast enough? 2016.
[5] Tobias Habermann, Jonas K¨uhle, Martin Kumm, and Anastasia Volkova. Hardware-aware quantization for multiplierless neural network controllers. In 2022 IEEE Asia Pacific Conference on Circuits and Systems (APCCAS), pages 541-545. IEEE, 2022.
[6] Giuseppe Franco, Alessandro Pappalardo, and Nicholas J Fraser. Xilinx/brevitas, 2025.
[7] Devansh Chawda and Benaoumeur Senouci. Fast prototyping of quantized neural networks on an FPGA edge computing device with Brevitas and FINN. In 2024 Fifteenth International Conference on Ubiquitous and Future Networks (ICUFN), pages 238-240. IEEE, 2024.
[8] Michaela Blott, Thomas B Preußer, Nicholas J Fraser, Giulio Gambardella, Kenneth O’brien, Yaman Umuroglu, Miriam Leeser, and Kees Vissers. FINN-R: An end-to-end deep-learning framework for fast exploration of quantized neural networks. ACM Transactions on Reconfigurable Technology and Systems (TRETS), 11(3):1-23, 2018.

**Principales activités**:
**Main Activities**
- Carry out the research related to the PhD topic described in the Assignments section.

**Additional Activities**
- Write papers
- Write a thesis
- Fulfill requirements for graduating, etc.

**Compétences**:
**Key Technical Skills**
- Masters degree in computer science (or equivalent)
- Advanced C++ programming
- Low level digital audio systems
- Audio Digital Signal Processing
- Embedded Systems
- Good background in AI in general.

**Languages**
- Fluent written and spoken English (all communication within the lab happens in English and the PhD thesis will be written in English)

**Relational skills**
- Independent
- Team work

**Avantages**:

- Subsidized meals
- Partial reimbursement of public transport costs
- Leave: 7 weeks of annual leave + 10 extra days off due to RTT (statutory reduction in working hours) + possibility of exceptional leave (sick children, moving home, etc.)
- Possibility of teleworking (90 days / year) and flexible organization of working hours
- Social, cultural and sports events and activities
- Access to vocational training
- Social security coverage under conditions

**Rémunération**:
2300 euros gross salary /month

**Informations générales**:

- **Thème/Domaine**: Systèmes embarqués et temps réel
Système & réseaux (BAP E)
- **Ville**: Villeurbanne
- **Centre Inria**: Centre Inria de Lyon
- **Date de prise de fonction souhaitée**: 2026-01-01
- **Durée de contrat**: 3 ans
- **Date limite pour postuler**: 2025-09-27

**Consignes pour postuler**:
**Sécurité défense**:
Ce poste est susceptible d’être affecté dans une zone à régime restrictif (ZRR), telle que définie dans le décret n°2011-1425 relatif à la protection du potentiel scientifique et technique de la nation (PPST). L’autorisation d’accès à une zone est délivrée par le chef d’établissement, après avis ministériel favorable, tel que défini dans l’arrêté du 03 juillet 2012, relatif à la PPST. Un avis ministéri