Doctoral Procedure for admission unitl 30.09.2019

Please refer to "b) after 1.10.2019  doctoral degree regulations May 2018 and the proper Implementation rules of the departmental doctoral committee of Biology

At Universität Hamburg doctoral students must be enrolled for the duration of their doctoral studies in accordance with the Hamburg Higher Education Act (Hamburgisches Hochschulgesetz, HmbHG) (Section 70 subsection 5) and the MIN Doctoral Degree Regulations.

If the Physics Subject Doctoral Committee accepts your admission application, use your acceptance letter to enroll. Please do this by the end of the semester following the beginning of your doctoral studies.

More information on enrollment.

Who can apply for supervision and examination rights

University lecturers and habilitated members of other departments or external institutions and PhDs may, upon application, be granted the "Supervision and Examination Rights for doctoral projects in the Department of Biology at UHH" for certain doctoral projects.

Doctoral candidates should submit the applications for supervision and examination rights together with the "Application for admission to doctoral procedures in the Department of Biology" or with the "Aplication to open doctorate proceedings in the Department of Biology".

Note: The documents for the application for the right to supervise and examine do not have to be resubmitted for subsequent applications after the first granting of the right to supervise and examine. In these cases, the proposal of the doctoral candidate in the "Application for admission to doctoral procedures in the Department of Biology" or "Aplication to open doctorate proceedings in the Department of Biology" is sufficient.

Documents to be submitted

For university lecturers and habilitated members of other departments or external institutions, please submit the following documents:

• curriculum vitae,
• list of publications,
• list of supervised theses (e.g. Bachelor's, Master's, Diploma, Doctorate),
• certificate of the last educational degree (more accurately the last appointment certificateappointment certificate).

For PhDs, please submit the following documents:

• curriculum vitae,
• list of publications,
• list of supervised theses (e.g. Bachelor's, Master's, Diploma, Doctorate),
• doctoral certificate,
• two references with telephone number and e-mail address.

Please send documents in a PDF via e-mail to the study office at promotion.biologie"AT"uni-hamburg.de.

Since we process doctoral procedures electronically, for data protection reasons we ask you to contact us via

• a uni-hamburg email address
• or a studium.uni-hamburg.de email address
• or an email address of the email domains chemie.uni-hamburg.de, informatik.uni-hamburg.de, zbh.uni-hamburg.de, hs.uni-hamburg.de, physik.uni-hamburg.de, physnet.uni-hamburg.de, uke.de or zmnh.uni-hamburg.de

to communicate and submit the above mentioned documents.

You can make a change to your correspondence email address on your own at any time until the oral defense is held after logging into Docata-MIN on the home page via the link Update your personal contact details in Docata now. You will find instructions on how to do this in this FAQ.

Application

If you are unable to complete your doctoral procedure with the disputation within 4 years of the start of the doctoral project, you must submit an application for an extension to the Academic Office Biology 3 months before the deadline expires.

Normally the application should include a justification and a proposal for the duration of the extended admission period. The (co-)supervisor must agree to the application and co-sign it (e.g. electronically).

Please send your application as a PDF via e-mail to the Academic Office Biology to promotion.biologie"AT"uni-hamburg.de.

Since we process doctoral procedures electronically, for data protection reasons we ask you to contact us via

• a uni-hamburg email address
• or a studium.uni-hamburg.de email address
• or an email address of the email domains chemie.uni-hamburg.de, informatik.uni-hamburg.de, zbh.uni-hamburg.de, hs.uni-hamburg.de, physik.uni-hamburg.de, physnet.uni-hamburg.de, uke.de or zmnh.uni-hamburg.de

to communicate and submit the above mentioned documents.

You can make a change to your correspondence email address on your own at any time until the oral defense is held after logging into Docata-MIN on the home page via the link Update your personal contact details in Docata now. You will find instructions on how to do this in this FAQ.

Deadlines

Prior to the expiry of the admission deadline, corresponding notifications about the expiry of the deadline are sent (via e-mail) to the doctoral candidates and to the (co-)supervisors.

Applications submitted to the Academic Office Biology by the 22nd of a month (except August and December) will be decided at the following meeting of the Biology Doctoral Committee.

The decision on your application will be sent to you at the beginning of the following month.

Legal basis

Section 4 subsection 5 of the MIN Doctoral Degree Regulations 2010

Admission is valid for four years. The dissertation should be submitted to the department doctoral committee within this period, which can be extended upon request. The extension application should be submitted to the departmental doctoral committee three months be-fore the end of the four-year period. The departmental doctoral committee must duly in-form both the supervisor and the doctoral candidate of the deadline.

Section 4 Subsection 5 of the Implementation rules of the departmental doctoral committee of Biology
After the expiry of the 4-year admission period, an annual letter has to be sent to the Specialist Doctoral Committee to briefly explain why an extension is requested for a further year to conclude the doctorate.

In accordance with § 7 of the Doctoral Degree Regulations, “The doctoral thesis (dissertation) should attest to the capacity for in-depth, independent research and document progress in scientific knowledge on the basis of notable findings worthy of publication”.

1) Form

•  A dissertation comprised of a single, coherent description of research work and results. If unpublished papers form part of the thesis, the candidate must indicate his or her specific contribution. Please see the criteria for properly indicating original work in or
• A cumulative dissertation consisting of individual papers, collectively equivalent to a dissertation in accordance with a) (cf. §7 of the Doctoral Degree Regulations). In accordance with the rule of procedure issued by the Departmental Doctoral Committee of Biology, a cumulative dissertation must comprise at least two publications accepted in peer-reviewed scientific journals. The doctoral candidate must be the first author of the publication at least once. For each publication, the doctoral candidate’s contribution must be explained in detail, on a separate sheet of paper, and approved and signed by the doctoral supervisor. In particular, doctoral candidates are obligated to state their contribution in terms of conception, experiment realization (which experiments have been conducted), data evaluation and the writing of the first version of the manuscript. The Doctoral Committee requests that you insert the complete list of submitted publications and the information on your own contributions signed by you and your supervisor directly after the cover sheet. Non-published data or data not intended for publication may be appended as a further chapter of the cumulative dissertation in the form of a scientific publication. The publications and further chapters must originate from a common topic and may not date back more than 4 years. The doctoral candidate should state the scientific context in the introduction (at least 10 pages) and discuss it in the final discussion of all chapters (at least 15 pages). There are no requirements regarding type sizes, font types, page margins, structure, etc.

• The title page of the dissertation must include the name of the author, the name of the fac-ulty and the organizational unit, the phrase „dissertation submitted to the University of Hamburg" and the year of submission. It must also include a cover page with the names of the evaluators.

2) Language

The dissertation can be written in English or German. An informal request may only be made with the Departmental Doctoral Committee if any other language is used.

3) Declaration on oath

Please do not forget the signed declaration on oath in each digital and printed copy of your dissertation. There has to be the german text and your signatur in each copy.

4) Technical specifications

There are no rules on font, size, line spacing etc. If you have any questions, please contact your supervisor.

Important information for the application

To ensure that your dissertation can be sent to the examiners immediately after the meeting of the Departmental Doctoral Committee, the application to open the doctorate preceedings must be submitted together with the dissertation. The Departmental Doctoral Committee meets at the end of each month (except August and December). The application to open the doctorate preceedings (see below) must be submitted no later than one week prior to the meeting (by the 22nd of each month) in order to be treated at the meeting.

We only process applications to open the doctorate proceedings (i.e. submission of the dissertation for evaluation) electronically! Application documents in paper form (except 1 examination copy of the dissertation in paper form for archiving purposes) are not requested, but also not accepted!

The following application documents must be prepared in electronic form for the online application to open the doctorate proceedings and submitted compulsorily as part of the online application:

• Current enrollment certificate (= semester certificate)
• Only if not already submitted during the application process for admission to doctoral procedures: Copy of identification document (e.g. ID card, passport, visa)¹

¹Please note: If you have changed your name after admission to doctoral procedures (e.g. due to marriage) and have not yet reported the name change to us (at the Academic Office), attach the relevant proof of the name change (e.g. marriage certificate) to the rest of the application documents.

• Only if applicable: Proof of interruptions of your doctorate

 The online application is done through Docata-MIN and includes two sections:

 Section 1

1. Log in to Docata-MIN with the login data of your user account (see FAQ for further information) and fill in the online application to open the doctorate proceedings.

2.  Complete the first section of the online application and download the PDF application file Application to open the doctorate proceedings: tick the applicable declarations in the PDF application file and sign the Application to open the doctorate proceedings by yourself and having it signed by the other persons/entities listed in the application².

²Scanned and electronic signatures are allowed.

 Section 2

Log in to Docata-MIN and complete the second section of the online application: upload the fully signed Application to open the doctorate proceedings and the remaining application documents (see above) in ONE PDF file (max. size 10 MB) to Docata-MIN and submit via Docata-MIN.

You will be notified as soon as the Subject Doctoral Committee has made a decision on your application.

Information on the timetable is provided for your further planning under the item "Oral defense and Timing".

Information on the composition of your examination committee and for the review of your dissertation

Important:

• At least one reviewer must have served as your supervisor. This person may also be external to UHH (e.g. from a research institute).
• At least one of your examiners has to be professor of the Faculty of Mathematics, Informatics and Natural Sciences and the Department Biology.

Wherever possible, commission members should come from different working groups or fields and, if required, an additional member should be appointed or a proposed member substituted. The majority of the members of the examination commission should not be comprised of examiners (Gutachter) of the dissertation.

Please submit the following documents to the Academic Office with your dissertation:

• 1 printed copy (without CD)
• 1 PDF in Docata (not more than 20 MB - must be uploaded when filing the application to open the doctorate preceedings)

Please submit your dissertation together with the application to open the doctorate preceedings digitally and by post to the Academic Office Biology.

Please note the following requirements about the dissertation (doctoral thesis) you are submitting for evaluation with this application:

You must submit only one printed bound copy of the dissertation to the responsible Academic Office for archiving (e.g. by mail). No further hard/paper copies of the dissertation need to be submitted to the responsible Academic Office.

Both the dissertation submitted in electronic form (via the Docata upload) and the printed bound copy of the dissertation submitted to the responsible Academic Office for archiving must contain your signed declaration upon oath.

Upon request, you will provide the appointed members of the examination commission and the reviewers (assessors) each with an additional bound hard copy of the dissertation. Agreements are to be made bilaterally between you and the appointed reviewers (assessors) and examination commission members; the responsible Academic Office is not involved in this coordination/agreement process. This bound hard copy of the dissertation must contain a declaration written and signed by you in which you declare that the copy and the dissertation submitted in electronic form (via the Docata upload) and the printed bound copy of the dissertation submitted to the responsible Academic Office for archiving are identical.

Registrations for the disputation are only accepted when the examination commission has determined the grade of your dissertation and you have received the grade notification. You will receive an email for this purpose.

After you have been informed by the Academic Office about the decision of the examination commission, please arrange the date with the examination commission and submit the form below.

IMPORTANT: PLEASE OPEN THE GRADE NOTIFICATION FILE STORED IN DOCATA. THERE YOU WILL FIND INSTRUCTIONS ON HOW TO PROCEED. DISPUTATIONS MUST BE REGISTERED AT LEAST 9 DAYS BEFORE THE DATE OF THE DISPUTATION. WITHOUT A REGISTRATION IN DUE TIME, THE DISPUTATION CANNOT TAKE PLACE. 

Oral Defense Registration Form (PDF)

You can leave the fields Building and Room empty.

Please plan for respective procedural stages as follows

• authorization of supervisors and appointment of the examination committee by the doctoral committee at the end of each month (except August and December)
• evaluations—six weeks max
• acceptance of the dissertation and grading by the examination committee—two weeks
• Arranging a date for the oral defense with the examination committee
• display of the evaluations and invitation period—at least one week

Should you not be able to complete your promisson procedure within the admission deadline (graduation is the disputation), you must submit an informal application for an extension of the admission period to the Academic Office three months before the end of the deadline. This application must be accompanied by a statement of reasons and must also be signed by the supervisor.

After the disputation, you will receive a form with all the necessary information. For all kinds of publication envisaged on the form, the doctoral student will give a copy to the library of the Departments Biology. The faculty doctoral committee recommends the electronic publication of the thesis (notes from the Stabi).

Hand in the form with the necessary signatures in the study office. After receipt of the quittance of the Stabi the certificate can be issued. The creation of the certificate can currently take up to 3 months from the date of fulfilment of the publication obligation. 

If for substantial reasons a supervisor or the doctoral candidate feels compelled to terminate the supervisory relationship during the course of dissertation work, then they must inform the chair of the subject doctoral committee in writing of the reasons therefor without undue delay.

Upon termination of the supervisory relationship, the doctoral candidate may search for a new supervisor. The subject doctoral committee shall assist the doctoral candidate with his or her search.

Form for the termination of the supervision agreement (PDF)