Thesis (Master): Evaluation of Standardized Physical Device Interaction by AI Agents

Location: Erlangen

Department: FT RPD CPC SSI-DE

Mode of Employment: Fixed Term / Full-Time; (35 hours / week)

Ready to bring the future of AI-driven hardware interaction to life? Join us in Erlangen as a Master's Thesis student and help pioneer how intelligent agents autonomously discover, control, and safeguard physical devices in real-world environments

What we offer you

• Exciting research and development projects that put your theoretical knowledge into practice
• Individual supervision and support from experienced experts in your field
• Access to the latest technologies, laboratories, and resources
• Diverse opportunities to contribute your ideas and actively shape the projects
• Excellent career opportunities through contact with potential employers

You'll make an impact by

• You currently study successfully in a field such as Computer Science, Electrical Engineering, or a related discipline, applying your academic knowledge to real-world device interaction challenges
• Building on this foundation, you evaluate the performance of large language models (LLMs) in semantic discovery tasks, probing and mapping unknown physical devices via various industrial communication protocols
• Subsequently, you analyze and compare description standards—such as MCP, MHS, OPC UA, W3C WoT, and AsyncAPI—to assess their impact on token consumption, expressiveness, interface quality, safety, and reliability
• In addition, you research and implement methods to deterministically extract hardware safety limits from device metadata, ensuring the absence of physical damage during autonomous operation
• Finally, you investigate approaches for autonomous authentication and access control, contributing to the secure configuration of devices in dynamic, ad-hoc environments

This is how you'll win us over

• Education: You are currently enrolled in a Master's program in Computer Science, Electrical Engineering, Robotics, or a related field
• Experience and Skills:
  • Strong proficiency in Python; knowledge of C/C++ and Rust is beneficial
  • Experience with LLM integration and agentic AI software development
  • Basic understanding of hardware-software interfaces and measurement technology, with an interest in industrial communication protocols such as OPC UA and Web of Things
• Ways of Working: You work independently and thrive on exploring complex, innovative system architectures
• Languages: Very good English skills are required

You are much more than your qualifications, and we believe in the potential of every single candidate. We