Research Fellow / Research Engineer (AI for Railway Inspection)

About the role

The Singapore Institute of Technology is seeking a Research Fellow (PhD) or Research Engineer (Master's degree) for a fixed-term project in the Infocomm Technology research division. The project develops AI solutions for intelligent railway inspection and predictive maintenance, using multi-modal sensor data to detect defects early and support safer, more efficient railway operations. It works closely with industry partners on real-world challenges.

Key responsibilities

• Develop AI-based solutions for automated defect inspection and condition assessment of train components through deep learning, computer vision and machine learning algorithms.
• Work with industry partners to understand operational needs and build AI pipelines for visual and sensor data collected during inspections.
• Build, train, validate and deploy AI models for industrial use.
• Design experiments and evaluate the performance and robustness of the algorithms.
• Prepare technical reports, research publications, presentations and project deliverables.
• Assist in supervising junior researchers and students where appropriate.

Required profile

• PhD (Research Fellow) or Master's degree (Research Engineer) in Computer Science, AI, Computer Vision, Machine Learning, Robotics or a closely related field.
• Experience developing, training, validating and deploying AI models for industrial inspection, predictive maintenance or asset condition monitoring.
• Proven experience in AI solutions for industrial inspection, predictive maintenance or asset condition monitoring, and hands-on experience deploying AI systems in industrial environments.
• Experience with defect detection, anomaly detection or visual inspection systems.
• Ability to conduct independent research within a multidisciplinary team, with strong analytical, problem-solving and software development skills.

Required skills

• Familiarity with multimodal sensing: RGB imaging, thermal imaging, 3D vision or other non-destructive inspection methods.
• Experience with edge AI, real-time inference or MLOps for industrial applications.
• Knowledge of railway systems, transportation engineering or infrastructure inspection.
• Experience collaborating with industry partners and delivering applied research.