Thesis document: review, deposit, and defense

Form repository

All forms required in the following instructions can be found in Doctoral School webpage.

Thesis types

The program allows two different types of Thesis: standard and article-based.

Standard Thesis

A standard thesis consists  of a self-contained document including original research contributions (regulation).

Article-based Thesis

An article-based thesis consist of some publications on prestigious journals or conference proceedings showing significant research contributions together with brief document giving the appropriate context. This modality is not intended as a general option, but as an exceptional case for research works with remarkable publications. Besides, there must be a good reason for not following the standard procedure. Examples of what the Committee may consider a good reason: i) A student comes out with a very impactful sharp result (a new theorem or algorithm) that justifies by itself a PhD, but does not fit in the standard long thesis document. ii) As a result of his/her work, a student wants to found a start-up and  writing a standard thesis document will only be a burden for that.

As a general rule, a minimum of three high-quality research publications in the same area, and inside the field of Artificial Intelligence are required for accepting a request for article-based thesis.

Before submitting an article-based thesis for review, approval by the Post-graduate Committee must be obtained, sending to the Committee president (Javier Larrosa) the application form along with a motivation letter explaining why the thesis should be presented as a collection of articles.

The application form must include the list of publications, with quality indicators about each one (Impact factors, journal quartiles, conference GGS rankings, number of citations, etc).  The form also contains an authorization by the thesis advisor to submit an article-based thesis, as well as the permission granting and waivers from any co-authors of the presented publications.

Find more details about the requirements and procedure on the related regulation.

If the application is accepted, the candidate may sumbit the article-based thesis for review.
If the application is rejected, the candidate must submit a standard thesis for review.

Confidentiality

If you wish to submit a thesis that is subject to confidentiality agreements with companies or contains patentable material you must ensure the necessary authorisation of the Academic Committee prior to the  review process. The Academic Committee will follow the necessary steps to guarantee that the process  is done with the required guarantees. 

In specific cases determined by the Academic Committee, such as company involvement or the possible generation of patents from the content of a doctoral thesis, in which confidential aspects of the thesis should not be made public. In such a case you have to inform the Academic Committee so that the procedure could be complemented and  guarantee the required  confidentiality level.

Thesis review process

Before being deposited, both types of thesis go through an identical review process made by anonymous reviewers. This process is double-blind, and it is managed by the CS Department Review Manager. The reviewer's report will be analyzed by the CS Department Post-graduate Committee and one of the following outcomes will be given:

• The thesis may proceed to deposit.
• The thesis has to go through a minor revision and be re-submitted for review.
• The thesis has to go through a major revision and be re-submitted for review.

Required Documentation

It is mandatory to create a zip file that contains the files which are listed next and to send it to the PhD Thesis Review Manager of the CS Department, Lluís Padró, sending an email to (chair-grad@cs.upc.edu).

1. A plain text (.txt) file with a summary of the thesis in English and list of publications, not exceeding two pages.
2. The PDF files of all papers enumerated in the list of publications.
3. A PDF preliminary draft version of the final PhD thesis document, where the publications must be properly referenced.The purpose of this document is to show to the reviewers the work developed, to put it in context to the state of the art and to highlight its novel contributions, its originality and its relevance. Note that article-based thesis have a well defined list of items that must appear in the thesis. Each reviewer will receive an electronic copy of the document and an electronic copy of the publications related to the thesis.
4. A plain text (.txt) file with a list of 10 candidates for external reviewers of the thesis. All candidates must be experts in the subject of the thesis, hold a PhD, and must not be affiliated with UPC or the PhD Program. Additionally, the proposed experts should hold an academic rank equivalent to or higher than Associate Professor (Profesor Titular de Universidad). A maximum of 4 candidates from the list of 10 may be affiliated with a Spanish university. None of the candidates should be co-authors with the PhD student. For each candidate, the following information is required: name and surname, academic rank (Professor, Associate Professor, etc.), affiliation, postal address (no P.O. boxes), email, and personal webpage (preferably) or institutional webpage.
5. A PDF file with the approval of the advisor(s) of the doctoral thesis (ADT form) to undergo the review process (as well as that of the tutor  when applicable).
6. If you are opting for the International Doctor mention, do not forget to inform the PhD Thesis Review Manager.
7. If you are sumbitting an article-based thesis, and you obtained the approval of the Post-graduate Committee, do not forget to inform the PhD Thesis Review Manager.

Timetable

The Post-graduate Committee will inform of the result of the external review process within a maximum of 12 weeks (standard thesis) or 10 weeks (article-based thesis) after receiving the documentation.
For the purpose of accounting periods, you must take into account that:

• the period from July 21st to September 1st will not be accounted
• the non-lecturing periods (Christmas and Holy Week holidays) from September 1st to June 30th will not be accounted

IMPORTANT: The thesis approval will expire after one natural year (Modification approved by the CS Department Board (Junta de CS) on 27/10/2004).

Steps previous to the PhD thesis deposit

After the review process and once the Postgraduate Committee gives its approval for the thesis deposit, the following documents must be filled:

• Quality report and authorization from the programme's academic committee for the presentation of the thesis: (ADU form)
  This document must be filled out with the Ph.D. candidate with thesis data, publications, projects, and impact.
  It must be sent to the Postgraduate Committee president (Javier Larrosa).
  
  
• Doctoral Student Activity Report [DAD99] you should  fill all the information on the DAD section of the Atenea-Phd/Drac  systems (see annual evaluation).  You must insure that the title of the thesis is the correct one in the prisma system  before the director(s)/tutor generates and validates the document, it will be accessible to the Academic Committee.

• Proposal of the thesis examination panel: (See form T)
  Complete the T form with the proposal of the examination panel must be filled out and send it to the Thesis Review Manager,  via email to (chair-grad@cs.upc.edu), toghether with a short curriculum vitae (200-word summary in a plain text (.txt) file) of each non-UPC member.
  The proposed panel must follow the Doctoral School regulations  :
  

  • Five doctors with proven research experience. This experience has to be demonstrated by their research curriculum for the non UPC members. Members from UPC have to fulfil the UPC acredited research criteria. 3 of them act as holders and 2 as substitutes.
  • No more than one member of the UPC may be present at the examination panel.
  • The majority of the proposed members must be non-UPC members.
  • If a panel member is a  co-author of the candidate a written justification of  the necessity of his/her participation in the panel is required.
  • If the thesis supervisor is not a member of UPC, then the examination panel must include a member of the UPC.
  • It is recommended that the person that acts as Secretary of the examination panel is a member of the department.
  • If the candidate is pursuing the “International Doctor” distinction, the thesis examination panel must include at least one doctoral-level expert from a non-Spanish institution of higher education or research. This expert may not be the person who certifies the student’s stay at the host institution.

  The examination panel cannot include:

  • The thesis supervisor and co-supervisor(s) or the tutor, if any
  • Anyone with a direct interest or incurring in whatever legal cause for abstention

  Please take into account the UPC co-financial restrictions:

  • See the Budget for the examination panel

Thesis deposit

• Original and copy of the DNI, NIE or passport.
• Original and copy of the degree that gave access to the doctorate programme.
• Two summaries one in English, and another one in Catalan or Spanish (form Thesis Summary)
• UNESCO codes (must be included in both thesis summaries) (see form Cod.UNESCO)
• Authorization of the thesis for the UPC supervisor/s (form ADT)
• Authorization of the Academic Committee of the programme (which the secretary already has after the thesis review process, from a step previous to the thesis deposit) (form ADU)
• Proposal of the examination panel (which the secretary already has) (form T)
• Curriculum vitae members panel (200 words in a .txt file)
  
• An e-mail address where to contact the candidate at least 3 years after the defense of the thesis
• TDX Declaration for PhD Thesis Dissemination on the Web [1].
• Fee of the deposit registration: public prices and registration (form M)
• A copy of the thesis in PDF format. The academic commitee of the programme may request that a paper copy also be provided.
• The CS department will make a contribution of up to 90 euros in concept of copies and bindings. The invoice must be issued to:
         UPC- Dept. de Ciències de la Computació
         c. Jordi Girona Salgado, 31
         08034 Barcelona
         CIF Q0818003-F

• If the International Doctor Mention is demanded: the original certificate of acknowledgement of the research stay, properly signed and stamped by the receiving institution, together with the request of Mention of International Doctor (form MI)

Act of public thesis defence

Once the thesis has been deposited, a minimum of 30 days is needed prior the thesis public defense. This time corresponds to the 10 days that the thesis should be under deposit, plus a second period of 10 days for panel of examiners designation plus a third period of 10 days needed after the notification to the Academic Committee of the date of the public defense.

The Academic Committee must ensure that mechanisms are in place for hosting the thesis defence on its own premises or in other UPC facilities. If a location outside the UPC is chosen, express authorisation must be received from the Doctoral Studies Committee and the Academic Committee must ensure that the arrangements comply with doctoral studies regulations and standard thesis assessment procedures.

The thesis defence must be held on a teaching day and is open to the public.

Reading and defense

The thesis defence consists in presenting the research carried out, the methodology used, the results obtained and the conclusions, focusing particularly on novel contributions to the field arising from the research.

In specific cases determined by the Academic Committee, such as company involvement or the possible generation of patents from the content of a doctoral thesis, the Doctoral Studies Office will ensure that confidential aspects of the thesis are not made public, as established in the section on theses subject to confidentiality agreements and/or intellectual property agreements.

Once the general presentation has been made, the examiners will ask questions and may seek clarification of particular aspects of the work. In addition, PhD holders attending the defence may ask questions when invited to do so by the chair of the examination panel.

The examination panel has access to the doctoral training log, which lists the principal activities carried out during the doctoral programme. The training log is not graded but the examiners will use it as a qualitative indicator to complement their assessment of the doctoral thesis.

Assessment

Once the defence and discussion of the thesis have been completed and the public has left the room, each examiner draws up an assessment report using a standard template. The completed reports are attached to the doctoral training log.

Finally, the examination panel will award the overall mark that it considers appropriate from the following: No apte, aprovat, notable o excel·lent. The mark is recorded on the assessment certificate, which must be signed by all of the examiners in attendance.

Before closing the session, the chair of the examination panel will notify the student and the public of the mark awarded.

Cum laude distinction

The cum laude distinction may be awarded if examiners reach a unanimous decision through secret written ballot. Votes are counted in a separate session, following the procedure established by the Doctoral Studies Committee of UPC.

Thesis dissemination

PhD Theses Dissemination on the Web

The TDX  server allows the remote consult of the complete text of the theses, as well as searches by author, title, subject of the thesis, university where it has been presented, etc.

The objectives of this service, coordinated by the Consorci de Biblioteques Universitàries de Catalunya (CBUC ) and the Centre de Supercomputació de Catalunya (CESCA ) and sponsored by the Departament d'Universitats, Recerca i Societat de la Informació de la Generalitat de Catalunya, are:

• To disseminate, worldwide and through Internet, the results of the Catalan universities research.
• To offer the authors of the theses a tool to increase the access and the visibility of their work.
• To improve the bibliographic control of the theses.
• To boost the electronic edition and the digital libraries.
• To encourage the creation and use of the own scientific production.

TDX was born as an outcome of a collaboration agreement signed on January 11, 2001 between the Catalan universities, CESCA and CBUC, from which the PhD theses presented in these universities can be viewed worldwide, free of charge and with research and education purposes only.

All the theses housed at TDX must be the original versions deposited in the Doctorate Office just before the thesis defence; either the digitized version of the paper copy or the digital version that is delivered to the Doctorate Office since 2004.