MSCA COFUND · CEFCA, Teruel, Spain
Four postdoctoral fellows. One observatory, one data centre, one outreach hub — training the leaders astrophysics needs next.
In the quiet region of Teruel, Spain, advanced telescopes scan the skies, data centres process cosmic images and outreach programmes bring the universe closer to the public. Led by the Centro de Estudios de Física del Cosmos de Aragón (CEFCA), this ecosystem will provide researchers with an unparalleled opportunity to explore the cosmos. With the support of the Marie Skłodowska-Curie Actions programme, the J-TRAIN project will offer the chance to four postdoctoral researchers to access three cutting-edge facilities: the Observatorio Astrofísico de Javalambre, the UPAD data centre and the outreach hub Galáctica. Beyond conducting groundbreaking research, participants will develop skills in project management, research ethics, mental health and more. J-TRAIN will shape tomorrow's leaders ready to drive innovation in astrophysics and other sectors.
The Javalambre TRAINing programme (J-TRAIN) is an MSCA COFUND initiative that will recruit four postdoctoral researchers on 48-month contracts, through an open and merit-based selection process, to the Centro de Estudios de Física del Cosmos de Aragón (CEFCA) in Teruel, Spain — one of the most sparsely populated regions of Europe. CEFCA offers an end-to-end astrophysics ecosystem, from data acquisition to societal outreach, anchored in its flagship large-area photometric surveys J-PAS, J-PLUS and J-VAR, and in its contribution to the ESA space mission ARRAKIHS.
Over the past two decades, astrophysics — and science more broadly — has undergone profound professionalisation. Researchers have become highly specialised in focused research topics, outsourcing robotic observations, image reduction and data management to dedicated teams, and relying on specialists for public outreach. While this division of labour has vastly improved efficiency and data quality, it has also fragmented the traditional "end-to-end" skill set once held by individual investigators — risking a lack of the holistic vision needed for strategic decision-making and effective team leadership. J-TRAIN directly addresses this management gap: four postdoctoral fellows, trained not only in frontier research but in the multidisciplinary and intersectoral competencies tomorrow's leaders in astrophysics actually need.
Each fellow pursues a research project anchored in CEFCA's flagship projects — generating publications, open datasets, software tools and outreach activities.
J-TRAIN targets a demonstrable net gain across all competences of the European Competence Framework for Researchers (ECFR), with at least 65% of each fellow's competences reaching an "advanced" level by the end of the programme.
The Centro de Estudios de Física del Cosmos de Aragón (CEFCA) covers the full dataflow from the sky to society, and manages three unique facilities that fellows will actively use during their training: the Observatorio Astrofísico de Javalambre, the Unit for Processing and Archiving of Data, and Galáctica.
1,956 m altitude, Pico del Buitre. Home to the JAST80 (0.8 m) and JST250 (2.5 m) survey telescopes, the ARRAKIHS ground-based demonstrator, and — from 2030 — a new 1.5 m telescope for planetary defence.
CEFCA's dedicated data centre: every OAJ image becomes science-ready here, backed by 5+ PB of storage and a ~540-core computing cluster, built around FAIR and Open Data principles and developing cutting-edge techniques in data reduction, calibration, etc.
CEFCA's astronomy outreach and public-engagement hub in Arcos de las Salinas — an interactive science museum and working observatory within a Starlight-certified dark-sky destination.
Flagship projects
56-filter photometric survey mapping thousands of square degrees from the JST250 telescope. By delivering a low-resolution spectrum for every pixel of sky, J-PAS traces the large scale structure of the Universe across cosmic history to probe the nature of dark energy, while building a vast legacy dataset for stellar, Galactic and extragalactic science.
j-pas.org ↗
12-filter survey of the Northern sky — 5 broad-band and 7 narrow-band — carried out with T80Cam on the JAST80 telescope. Originally designed to calibrate J-PAS, J-PLUS has grown into a major survey in its own right: its fourth data release covers 4,950 deg² and catalogues nearly 100 million objects, from Milky Way stars to distant galaxies.
j-plus.es ↗
Time-domain extension of J-PLUS: the same fields are revisited at least 33 times with a seven-filter strategy to track how sources change over months and years. Its first data release already delivered 1.3 million light curves, capturing variable objects from pulsating stars and novae to supernovae and moving Solar System bodies.
archive.cefca.es ↗
ESA F-class mission — the first led by Spain — designed to map the extremely faint stellar haloes and tidal features around 100 Milky Way-like galaxies, testing predictions of the cold dark matter model, for a planned 2030 launch. CEFCA leads the image-reduction pipeline, and a ground-based demonstrator already operates at the OAJ.
arrakihs-mission.eu ↗Where you'll live and work
Teruel offers one of Spain's most affordable, liveable research hubs, with easy road link to Zaragoza and Valencia (1.5 hours by car), UNESCO-listed Mudéjar architecture, and access to the dark skies of the Sierra de Javalambre. CEFCA's headquarters sit in Plaza San Juan, in the heart of the city.
The J-TRAIN programme offers a bottom-up approach to each fellow's research project, with the only constraint of being totally or partially based on CEFCA's flagship surveys or the ARRAKIHS mission — offering the opportunity to develop cutting-edge science with state-of-the-art datasets in multi-filter photometry and ultra-deep imaging. Complementarity with other wavelengths (radio, NIR, UV, X-ray), databases (SDSS, Gaia, DESI, Euclid, ZTF, etc.), theoretical predictions or cosmological simulations will be considered an asset.
The eight research lines shown below illustrate CEFCA's current expertise and are a helpful starting point, but a fellow's own project may be built around these or other research directions (e.g., gravitational waves or exoplanets), as long as the link to CEFCA's flagship surveys or the ARRAKIHS mission is maintained.
Each fellow benefits from dual supervision: a primary supervisor from CEFCA's research staff — assigned based on the best match with the project's needs — and an external co-supervisor bringing international expertise.
Wide-field, multi-epoch imaging from the OAJ is used to detect and characterise the physical and dynamical properties of Solar System bodies.
Multi-band photometry from J-PLUS and J-PAS provides precise atmospheric parameters across millions of stars in the Milky Way, complemented with time-domain coverage from J-VAR.
J-PLUS and J-PAS trace the structure, chemistry and stellar populations of the Milky Way and its satellite galaxies, providing clues about the assembly history of the Galaxy and its neighborhood.
Ultra-deep imaging reveals the faint stellar streams, tidal debris and diffuse structures that trace galaxy assembly history. The ARRAKIHS mission was adopted in June 2026, with its ground-based demonstrator already testing detection strategies for faint stellar streams from the OAJ.
Photo-spectra from J-PAS and J-PLUS trace how galaxies build up their stellar mass and shut down star formation over cosmic time and at different environments since z = 1.
J-PAS and J-PLUS narrow-band photometry identifies and characterises active galactic nuclei across a wide range of redshifts and luminosities.
J-PLUS and J-PAS narrow-bands open a systematic path to finding rare, emission-line objects at z > 2.
The combined large area and photometric redshift precision (0.3%) of J-PAS provides a unique large-scale galaxy sample to constrain cosmological models.
J-TRAIN's training runs across four complementary pillars, covering 23 individual activities mapped onto the European Competence Framework for Researchers. Every fellow builds their own path through an individual Career Development Plan, agreed with their supervisors and mentor at the start of the fellowship.
Fellows manage their own research funding, define and update their Career Development Plan with their supervisors, explore funding opportunities across Aragón, Spain and Europe, write grant proposals as PI, supervise summer interns and PhD students, and attend advanced thematic schools on topics from Bayesian inference to machine learning.
A dedicated programme of one-day, expert-led sessions covers gender balance and inclusive leadership, mental health and resilience, research ethics and data integrity, and scientific writing — including attendance at a specialised writing school.
Each fellow completes two independent two-month research secondments abroad, at a J-PAS, J-PLUS or ARRAKIHS partner institution — or at any host they propose and their supervisors endorse — fully funded through a fellow-managed €24,000 travel and networking allowance.
Fellows rotate through CEFCA's own facilities: an OAJ observing school culminating in an individual observing run, an engineering placement, an Open Science/FAIR-principles course, a UPAD data-processing internship, training in science communication, and a teaching practicum at Galáctica.
Visits to Satlantis (aerospace instrumentation), Eurecat (applied data services) and AstroÁndalus (astrotourism) open fellows' eyes to careers beyond academia, complemented by attendance at knowledge-transfer and entrepreneurship forums.
CEFCA hosts and coordinates the entire J-TRAIN programme, from its three research facilities to the selection process itself — the constant at the centre of a community that reaches from Teruel to partner institutions worldwide.
Alongside their primary CEFCA supervisor, every fellow works with an external co-supervisor from an international partner institution — chosen individually as part of each fellow's Career Development Plan (CDP).
International supervision partnerships will be listed here once the cohort's CDPs are confirmed, after onboarding (2027).
Each fellow completes two international secondments, also defined individually within their CDP. Confirmed partner institutions already include:
Basque space-technology company developing the camera for ARRAKIHS. Satlantis provides a direct link between ground-based astronomy at the OAJ and space-based instrumentation.
satlantis.com ↗
Catalonia's technology centre, working across artificial intelligence, data science, robotics and advanced materials. A close-up view of how UPAD's data skills translate into industrial machine-learning pipelines.
eurecat.org ↗
Astrotourism company based in Jaén and concessionaire for Galáctica's outreach activities and observations on behalf of CEFCA. It provides a case study of how dark-sky tourism can support a rural economy.
astroandalus.com ↗
CALL OPENS 15 SEPTEMBER 2026 · DEADLINE 15 NOVEMBER 2026
An open, transparent, merit-based selection process for four postdoctoral fellowships.
Go to selection portal →Open Zoom session to present the programme details and answer questions about the call. Two identical sessions are offered on the same day to cover different time zones — join whichever suits you best.
J-TRAIN follows the MSCA COFUND eligibility rules. To apply, candidates must:
J-TRAIN actively promotes equal opportunities throughout recruitment, welcoming applicants of all nationalities (subject to the mobility rule), genders and ages. Applications from candidates belonging to groups underrepresented in our staff are particularly welcome. In line with CEFCA's commitment to gender parity among its research personnel, applications from women are strongly encouraged.
Applications must include:
J-TRAIN offers a competitive, transparent remuneration package fully compliant with MSCA standards.
Published on EURAXESS, social media and discipline-specific mailing lists. Deadline: 15 November 2026.
Formal eligibility check of all applications received. Each phase decision carries a 10-calendar-day redress option for formal appeals.
Scored by three independent reviewers against a published rubric.
Structured interviews with the twelve shortlisted candidates.
Offers to the top four candidates, each with ten working days to accept or decline.
Visa acquisition, relocation support and arrangements for a smooth move to Teruel. The fellowship will start on the first day of a month, between 1 April and 1 September 2027.
Handbook, templates and reference materials for your application all live in one place.
This is where our four researchers will introduce their work — and share their results — once selected.
Four seats in the J-TRAIN, waiting to be filled. Once fellows are onboarded, this page will introduce each of them — their research, their supervisors, and where their secondments take them.
Publications, open datasets, software releases and outreach outcomes produced by J-TRAIN fellows will be tracked and published on this page.
The J-TRAIN call is open for applicants. Deadline 15 November 2026.
The portal with all the information about the MSCA COFUND postdoctoral programme J-TRAIN is now online.
Handbook, templates and reference materials — all in one place.
The full programme guide: training, conditions, eligibility and selection criteria.
Download →Step-by-step walkthrough of the online application platform, with screenshots.
Download →Narrative trajectory plus structured tables for contributions, funding and teaching.
Download →The required 8-page structure, mapped to the Phase 1 evaluation rubric.
Download →Recording of the information sessions on 15 October 2026.
Not yet availableSlides of the information sessions on 15 October 2026.
Not yet availableThis policy covers specifically the personal data processed during the J-TRAIN selection process.
