Student AI Avatar Dev: Unity Frontend & LLM Backend

Immigration Policy Lab; Zürich; Hybrid; CHF 20,000 - 29,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Hands‑on experience with high‑profile/

Mentoring and collaboration

International team at ETH Zurich

Job summary

ETH Zürich's Digital Einstein team seeks a Student Research Assistant to develop and maintain the Unity frontend and Python/LLM backend for a high-profile AI avatar platform. The role combines real-time rendering, interaction design, and backend orchestration of LLMs, with on-site demonstrations and weekly team meetings.

You will work ~15 hours/week during term, with flexibility for semester breaks, collaborating with an international, cutting-edge research group.

Qualifications

• Enrolled student at ETH Zurich or another Swiss university.
• Strong programming skills and practical software‑development experience.
• Experience with Unity and C#.
• Experience with Python.
• Interest in large language models, including LLM APIs, prompting, agentic systems, or dialogue systems.
• Reliable, proactive, and comfortable working independently as well as in a team.
• Willingness to provide occasional on‑site event support, including on weekends.
• German language skills are a plus.

Responsibilities

• Develop and maintain the Unity frontend for the Digital Einstein platform, including UI components, interaction flows, character behaviours, and real‑time rendering features
• Develop and maintain the Python/LLM backend for interactive conversations, including the integration and evaluation of large language models and related AI services
• Test and improve the reliability, latency, and overall interaction quality of the system
• On‑site support at selected events and demonstrations
• Participate in weekly team meetings (1–2 hours) to discuss progress and plan next steps
• Workload: approximately 15 hours/week during the semester, with the possibility of working more during semester breaks

Skills

Strong programming skills

LLM knowledge

Experience with Unity

Experience with C#

Experience with Python

Independent work

Teamwork

German language skills (plus)

Education

Enrolled student at ETH Zurich or another Swiss university

Tools

Unity

Python

C#

Job description

ETH Zürich's Digital Einstein team seeks a Student Research Assistant to develop and maintain the Unity frontend and Python/LLM backend for a high-profile AI avatar platform. The role combines real-time rendering, interaction design, and backend orchestration of LLMs, with on-site demonstrations and weekly team meetings.

You will work ~15 hours/week during term, with flexibility for semester breaks, collaborating with an international, cutting-edge research group.