9. Justification of the appointment of young researchers

The network contains about 200 senior scientists, most of them experienced in hosting TMR Pre/Post docs, in order to carry out the work programme and deliver at least 580 person months of "European training" with the requested funding.

The size and structure of HYKE implies a broad range of complementary training opportunities in the different teams/satellites : some satellites have a certain specialization in modeling and applications, others in diverse analytical methods and some are numerically oriented.

It is impossible to detail the full complementarity and interdisciplinarity of HYKE in the format prescribed by this proposal. We attempt to give a clear idea by means of the tables and in the graphics and refer to (names in) the 15 pages of"collective experience". It is important to note that the careful setup of HYKE has created a "unity in the diversity" of individual strength at the satellites and a common mathematical language is spoken throughout the network. When setting up the network and allocating the training to the nodes in the proposal the TOs had in mind the complementarity and work programme of the network both for hiring and sending the young researchers of their satellites to other nodes.

However, it seems rather useless to write now and try to enforce a rigid detailed rule for this, but rather deal with each young researcher individually.

In order to implement an optimal training programme and take care of the young researchers in the best possible way, an original type of committee is at the core of this RTN network :

Training Committee (TC)

The TC assists TOs (Team Organizers) and CO in all training aspects and helps actively the groups in finding young researchers, e.g. in advertisement of open positions. The TC is geographically and scientifically balanced, as far as possible without becoming inefficiently large. The precise internal rules and tasks of the training committee will be finalized by itself, in consultation with CO and SiC, when the contract negotiation phase is reached and eventually new aspects of the ERA are implemented by the commission.

The TC systematically monitors the Pre/Postdoc hiring : every TO informs the TC by e-mail with a few lines, including a vita and publication list, about a Pre/Postdoc whom sHe hires. Also, each TO sends the TC an individual training programme for each network Pre/Postdoc where sHe addresses why the training at a certain satellite of his team is beneficial for the young researcher and for fulfilling the HYKE workprogramme, addressing the research objectives that will be tackled, as far as it makes sense in advance. The mere information the TC represents a self-control mechanism of training quality that prevents hiring too weak people or people working completely outside the broad work-programme. In the last consequence, the TC can detect malfunctioning of a group concerning hiring. These self assessments of the training will start in the preparation of the first annual report. Groups that did not deliver any training at this moment might be asked for shifts of training months to groups that succeed well in fulfilling their contractual duties on the main delivery of HYKE, with scientific quality beyond a certain threshold to be defined by the network scientists themselves. The task is not a dynamical allocation of the training, but a positive assistance to fulfill the initial contract in the best interest of the young researchers.

Another important role of the TC is the coordination/choice of summer/winter schools, workshops and other training activities. To this end, it also surveys relevant training activities outside this network and keeps track of relevant conferences

The TC is assisted by the"Industry advisory board" (IAB) for promoting training activity with industry participation. (see C.12 for details on the IAB). A benchmark in this respect is the annual CEMRACS summer school at the French CIRM (cf C.10). A good link outside academia stems also from the inclusion of French INRIA and CERMICS (Ecole Nationale des Ponts et Chaussées) researchers.

Also, the TC nominates a member who takes care, assisted by (the coordinator's) staff, of systematic collection of information from the Pre/Postdocs about"problems". Thus the young researchers have a direct"hotline" that disposes of large knowledge of such problems and bypasses the TO by addressing this {"confidential person" in the TC in case the TO is in a"conflict-of-interest" situation, e.g. if sHe is the PhD adviser. The mere existence of such a formal procedure is expected to prevent any problem in this respect.
In order to assist in the ERA task, the TC helps the CO to organize structured and complete information from the network about transnational aspects like "obstacles to mobility" etc.

The TC is composed as follows :
Y. Brenier (head) (F3), A. Nouri (F3), M. Escobedo (E1), F. Otto (D2), B. Makridakis (G1), R. Natalini (I1), H. Holden (S2), J. Malek (A1)

Equal opportunities

A special role is given to TC member Anne Nouri, who in addition to the general tasks also serves as the female representative in the TC :
In order to foster gender balance, in case of equal scientific qualification among several applicants, female candidates will have priority. The female representative has the duty to inform the TC in case she detects a violation of this rule in the pending appointment of a Pre/Postdoc by a TO. The TC then has to discuss the case and make a formal vote. In case the TC votes against the female representative she has the right to inform the CO who will consult the head of the TC and the TO involved and help to find a solution. The mere existence of such a formal procedure is expected to prevent any problem in this respect.

Different types of (Pre/)Post-Doc appointments:

i) long term Pre- or Post Docs (about a year) at one team combined with short visits to other teams (more feasible for "different methodology" training/work).
ii) mid/long term Post or Pre docs (about 6 months) at different teams (mainly 2, if needed 3) (more feasible for interdisciplinary work/training).
iii) short term Post Docs (1-3 months) (people already holding (tenured) positions)) (focused work on particular tasks of the work programme).

There is clearly a need of Pre/Post-doc appointments with flexible length for Pre and Postdocs and a RTN of this size is the perfect flexible structure for implementing this. These short term contracts are not meant to just bridge time between 2 other contracts of a person, but as a possibility that also young people already on tenure(-track) positions (like it is the rule for the best French PhDs) have a good incentive to be mobile also within the ERA (and not only do the common PostDoc in the US). In the hyperbolic and kinetic TMR networks several of such PostDocs had an outstanding performance.

Publication of vacancies:

The coordinating team will set up a state-of-the-art web-page for this TMR-network, where openings for post-doc positions and grants for doctoral students from all teams of this network will be posted (they will also be listed in the individual homepage of the respective team). In parallel these vacancies will also be published via CORDIS, in the Newsletter of the European and American Mathematical Society (EMS, AMS) and many more.

The salaries are fixed in such a way that they are competitive with respect to the corresponding university positions in each university. The flexible, i.e. sufficiently high salaries/grants help to invert the brain drain to the US . Several European top scientists partially active in the US are included in the network and are expected to provide a good interface with the American scientific community in various ways, but in particular by actively inviting (European) post docs from the US. Also, using the flexibility, an allowance for special needs of Pre/Postdocs with children will be implemented, if permitted by the rules of the commission.