Postdoctoral Fellowships in Astrophysics at Pontificia Universidad Católica de Chile

The Institute of Astrophysics at Pontificia Universidad Católica (IA-PUC) and the Center of Astro-Engineering of the Universidad Católica (AIUC) invite applications for sponsoring postdoctoral research fellowships in the areas of observational, theoretical, and computational astrophysics, and instrumentation. Sponsored fellows are expected to carry out independent research in close collaboration with one or more faculty members at IA-PUC (www.astro.uc.cl) and/or AIUC (www.aiuc.ing.uc.cl). IA-PUC/AIUC professors will sponsor selected candidates applying for 3-year FONDECYT postdoctoral fellowship grants from the Chilean funding agency, ANID, or other national and international funds. The fellowships offer a competitive salary and funding for travel, equipment, and relocation expenses (when applicable). Awarded FONDECYT fellowships are expected to begin on April 1st, 2026, with eligibility limited to PhDs received between Jan 1, 2022 (or Jan 1, 2021, for women who recently had a child) and June 30, 2025, and granted before the application deadline.

The IA-PUC/AIUC provides a vibrant, dynamic, and productive international environment with 14 professors, 15+ postdoctoral researchers (~50% of them FONDECYT fellows), and 50+ graduate students. Members of IA-PUC/AIUC are leading or are active participants in several ongoing international collaborations, including:, Frontier Fields Survey, LAGER and CIDER surveys, PESSTO, AHA, COSMOS, BASS, SDSS-V, LSST project, LSST Dark Energy Science Collaboration (DESC), Dipole Oriented SN Cosmology (DOSC), Vista Variables Via Lactea (VVV), HSTPROMO, the Next Generation Fornax/Virgo Surveys (NGFS/NGVS), Neighborhood Watch Survey, The HST Coma Cluster Core Project (C3PO), the Atacama Cosmology Telescope (ACT), the Simons Observatory, the Cosmology Large Angular Scale Surveyor (CLASS), VLT Multi-Object Optical and Near-infrared Spectrograph (VLT-MOONS), 4-m Multi-Object Spectroscopic Telescope (4MOST), Fibre Dual Echelle Optical Spectrograph (FIDEOS), TAO-AIUC high-Resolution Y band Spectrograph (TARdYS), the Cherenkov Telescope Array (CTA), and the Southern Wide-field Gamma-ray Observatory (SWGO), among numerous others. IA-PUC is also part of the French-Chilean Laboratory for Astronomy (FCLA, http://www.fcla.cl/).

While resident at IA-PUC/AIUC, postdoctoral fellows qualify as members of the Chilean community with privileged access to 10% of the observing time on all telescopes in Chile, including ESO/Paranal's 4x8m VLT, and 4m VISTA, 2.6m VST, La Silla's 3.5m NTT, and 3.6m and 2.2m telescopes, Gemini-South 8m, Carnegie's 2.5m and Magellan 2x6.5m, CTIO's 4m (Blanco), SOAR 4m, as well as ASTE, APEX, and ALMA. Our Institute also has a significant interest in work related to next-generation telescopes to be placed in Chile, such as ELT, LSST, GMT, CTA, and SWGO. Additionally, the IA-PUC/AIUC hosts two supercomputers and a GPU cluster, available for numerical simulations, large databases, and data analyses.

In anticipation of the ANID FONDECYT call for applications (expected for early April, 2025), we strongly encourage interested applicants to make early contact with potential sponsors among IA-PUC/AIUC professors working on their subjects of interest (see https://astro.uc.cl/en/investigacion/). Interested applicants should submit their CV using this form: https://form.jotform.com/250837145658667. For questions or guidance on the process, please email Prof. Julio Chanamé ([email protected]). Helpful information regarding salary, benefits, working, and living conditions for new postdocs is available at: http://facultadfisica.uc.cl/oficina-de-postdoctorados#international-postdocs.

IA-PUC and AIUC are committed to equal opportunity and diversity in the workforce. Women and minorities are strongly encouraged to apply.