Practical Manual PhD - Pharmaceutical Sciences

Remarks:

• The time schedule as mentioned below applies to PhD students with a full time research contract.
• Motivated requests for extended terms will be considered by the Doctoral Committee.
• For part-time PhD students another time schedule is applicable. The activities in Year 3 and 4 should be postponed to Year 5 and 6.
• Specific information about all obligatory parts of the doctoral training can be found on http://gbiomed.kuleuven.be/english/bsrc/phd/PhD_Students/doctoral_training.html.
• PhD students are obliged to keep a record of all steps in their doctoral training and of their acquired skills and expertise in the E-Portfolio. This is a notebook accessible via Toledo (http://toledo.kuleuven.be/). We recommend to share the portfolio with your (co-)promoter from the beginning of your doctoral training, that way s/he can keep track of your progress. After graduation this notebook can be used as a personal portfolio. For more info on how to use the E-Portfolio, please read the manual.

Content:

1. Registration in the Doctoral School of Biomedical Sciences(1st year)

The first formal step in your PhD track is the registration. The procedure for this is described in Article 10 § 1 of the Doctorate Regulations.

2. Enrollment for the PhD Training Programme (1st year)

In the first year of your PhD, you must also enroll for the PhD training programme at the University.
Enrollment for students with a Belgian master's degrees is only possible with the permission of the administrative coordinator of the PhD programme, i.e. after your registration pack has been accepted.
All other students receive their permission from the International Office.
After enrollment you will receive a K.U.Leuven student card and you will have official access to the University's facilities.

3. Progress Report (1st year): Provisional Doctoral Plan

The next step in the process of obtaining a PhD is the submission of a provisional doctoral plan. The procedure is described in Article 10 § 2 of the Doctorate Regulations.
The project must be written clearly and it must be understandable by scientists working outside the specific research field covered by the project. One or two figures or schemes may be used. It may be written in Dutch or English.

Outline of the provisional doctoral plan

• Title page (= page 1)
  • Title (this will not necessarily be the final title of your thesis)
  • Name of applicant
  • Name and affiliation of promoter and co-promoter(s)
  • Location where the research will be done (address for correspondence)
  • Available grant support (FWO, IWT, ...) with dates
  • Doctoral school programme
  • Starting date ( = date of registration for the doctoral training, not predoc!)
  • Expected end date
• Introduction and background (= page 2)

  Give a brief introduction with an overview of the general and specific background of the project (refer to recent and relevant review articles) and identify the gaps in current knowledge; indicate whether this is the continuation of an existing research line within the research unit or whether this is a totally new research.

• General hypothesis and specific aims of the project

• Methodology
  Mention the techniques you will use. Clearly indicate
  1. whether they are existing techniques or have to be developed as part of the PhD project;
  2. whether these techniques involve collaborations with third party labs;
  3. status of request by the ethical committee (if relevant).
• Milestones and timing of PhD project

  Give a short description of the different steps in the PhD project including a time schedule with the estimated date of completion. Also address the feasibility of the proposed project.

• If data have been collected before the start of the doctorate, please mention this in your provisional doctoral plan so the committee can approve that these data will be used for your project.

• Conclusion: e.g. the estimated end points/deliverables of the PhD projects.
• References (= page 5)

Assessment of the provisional doctoral plan
In formulating its recommendations, the Doctoral Committee will focus mainly on the following criteria:

• Is the objective of the research important and is it clearly described?
• Is the objective of the research attainable in the context of a PhD project?
• Is the proposed approach appropriate and feasible within the scope of a PhD project? Is the task of the doctoral candidate described in concrete terms?
• Does the PhD project fit within the broader research activities of the promoter and his/her research unit, thus ensuring scientific and technical support for the project?
• Are there any overlaps with other thesis projects in the same research group?
• If the project forms part of a larger research programme and/or if several persons are involved in carrying out the project, it should be indicated clearly what the personal input of the doctoral candidate will be.

After examining the provisional doctoral plan, the Doctoral Committee will issue a substantiated opinion. A positive opinion will be ratified by the Group's Board Biomedical Sciences and notified in writing to the candidate and the promoter by the chairman of the Doctoral Committee. The Doctoral Committee will also discuss the experts for the Thesis Advisory Committee suggested by the promoter.
 

After approval of the provisional plan and jury proposal, the candidate may already contact the assigned jury members to inform them about his project. The candidate can also send his provisional doctoral plan to the jury members.
Approval of the provisional doctoral plan by the Doctoral Committee also means that this doctoral plan is accepted as a component of the PhD training programme.
 

If the doctoral plan has been rejected, a new version is to be submitted within three months.

4. Re-enrollment for the PhD Training Programme (2nd year)

You must re-enroll for the PhD training programme each year. These re-enrollments are free of charge

5. Progress Report (2nd year): Research Seminar

In the second semester of your second year of PhD training you will be invited by the Doctoral Committee to present your PhD project during a research seminar before the Thesis Advisory Committee.

Announce your research seminar online (research seminar).

After the presentation has been held, please organise an informal meeting with your (co)promoter and jury members for a feedback discussion. A short report fo this meeting should be sent to your file administrator. Please use the standardised form and have it filled out by the chair of your thesis advisory committee and signed by all committee members.

Share your e-portfolio with the coördinator of your doctoral school programme.

6. Re-enrollment for the PhD training programme (3rd year)

The same procedure applies as for re-enrollment PhD training programme (2nd year)

7. Progress Report (3rd year): Final Doctoral Plan

In the third year you should hand in your final doctoral plan to the administrative cell of the PhD programme. Article 8 § 4 of the doctorate regulations.

The plan has to be defended towards the Thesis Advisory Committee. The candidate will be assessed on both the doctoral plan and his/her scientific knowledge.

Outline of the final doctoral plan
This document comprises a maximum of 3,500 words (spaced 1,5), has to be written in Dutch or English and consists of:

• An introduction situating the planned research project within the framework of the discipline, such that its relevance is made clear, also for non-specialists.
• Objective: a concise formulation of the working hypothesis.
• Method and general procedure: indication of the experimental material used and methods applied; where appropriate, also a concise explanation of techniques newly developed or to be developed. If you have a number from the ethical committee, please also mention this in your final doctoral plan.
• The results already obtained, certainly if they are already part of publications in the research domain (include references)
• Experiments still to be carried out.
• Bibliography: approx. 10 key references on the research domain

Assessment of the final doctoral plan
During a presentation (with maximum 15 slides) lasting no more than 15 minutes, the doctoral candidate presents the final doctoral plan to the Thesis Advisory Committee, which will interrupt the candidate and ask questions. The total duration of the session is limited to a maximum of 60 minutes. After the presentation and discussion the Committee will deliberate in the absence of both the candidate and the (co)promoter(s). The (co)promoter(s) and the candidate will then be informed of the decision of the Committee and any particular recommendations will be discussed. The decision of the Committee may be that:

• The doctoral plan is accepted; Approval of the final doctoral plan by the Thesis Advisory Committee also means that this doctoral plan is accepted as a component of the PhD training programme.
• The doctoral plan is accepted sub conditione. Additional conditions for acceptance may be:
  • including additional experiments in the thesis proposition
  • presenting an additional literature seminar
  • rewriting the submitted text
• The doctoral plan and/or candidate are rejected. In case of rejection of the final doctoral plan a revised doctoral plan can be submitted.

If the second version is also rejected the candidate will be asked to stop the PhD training.

The Thesis Advisory Committee decides which members will take part in the Examining Committee of the thesis.

The final doctoral plan will be discussed by the Thesis Advisory Committee. Their meetings will be scheduled ad-hoc; no fixed dates are foreseen.

8. Re-enrollment for thePhD Training Programme (4th year)

The same procedure applies as for re-enrollment PhD training programme (2nd year)

10. Completion of PhD Training Programme (4th year)

In the course of the 4th year (at least 3 weeks before the submission of the thesis manuscript) you should transmit the e-portfolio describing your doctoral training programme to the chair of the doctoral committee and the administrative coordinator of the doctoral programme.

11. Submission of Thesis Manuscript (4th year)

After completion of the doctoral research and the PhD training programme you can submit your thesis manuscript to the secretariat of the PhD programme. Article 8 § 6 of the doctorate regulations.

Outline of the manuscript

Following formulas are accepted as mentioned in the doctorate regulations:

• Formula 1: original, full text
  The thesis manuscript consists of a full text with illustrations following the traditional construction (introduction, objectives of the research, methodology & materials, results, discussion and global conclusions, abstract and list of references (no more than 200 references allowed)). The length of the thesis manuscript is limited to 150 pages including illustrations and list of references.

• Formula 2: compilation of research articles
  
  The thesis manuscript consists of:
  • general introduction limited to 30 pages
  • objectives of the research
  • At least two chapters written in the form of a research article. At least one of these chapters should have previously been published (or have been accepted for publication) in an international peer-reviewed journal. If unpublished parts of the study are being included into the manuscript then these have to be written in the form of an article to be published. In case of shared authorship with another PhD-student, the respective contributions of each PhD student need to be clearly indicated. It is the responsibility of the supervisor(s) to ensure that each PhD student is duly credited for her/his work.
  • A concluding discussion (at least 5 pages)
  • An abstract of the research
  • A list of references (no more than 100 references allowed) with regard to the introduction and the concluding discussion

Additional formal remarks for both formulas

• The text needs to be written in Dutch or in English
• The first page of the thesis manuscript has a mandatory format.
• You are free to design the cover of your thesis book. This template is optional to use.
• The scientific summary should be written in Dutch as well as in English.
• The manuscript includes a short description of the professional career of the PhD-student listing the published articles.

Assessment of the manuscript.
No later than 3 weeks (5 weeks during holiday recess) after receiving the manuscript, the jury members will send their written comments to the chair of the Examining Committee. The chair compiles a synthesis of the comments received and provides the candidate and promoter with a copy of the individual comments.
The candidate sends each member of the supervisory committee an adequate answer to his/her remarks, and the jury members inform the chair whether the reply meets the comments. If so, permission for printing and defence can be given.

12. Enrollment for the defence of the PhD thesis (4th year)

After the Examining Committee has given permission for the public defence, you will be enrolled for the defence of the PhD thesis.

13. Public defence (4th year)

The procedure for public defence is described in Article 8 § 8 of the Doctorate Regulations.

14. Graduation (4th year)

Following the public defence, the Examining Committee retires for deliberation. In the event of a positive decision, proclamation and conferral of the PhD degree follow immediately.

Congratulations! You are now a Doctor of Pharmaceutical Sciences or Doctor of Biomedical Sciences and ready for a scientific career.

 15. Diploma

After the rector has signed your diploma, you will be contacted by your file administrator to collect your diploma.