Doctoral program in History of Science

Objectives and competences

Objectives and competences

Objectives

Competences

Doctoral studies guarantee, as a minimum, the acquisition by the doctoral candidate of the following basic competences as well as those others that appear in the Spanish Higher Education Qualifications Framework:
a) Systematic understanding of a field of study and mastery of the skills and research methods related to this field.
b) Ability to conceive, design or create, implement and adopt a substantial research or creative process.
c) Ability to contribute to extending the frontiers of knowledge through original research.
d) Ability to carry out critical analysis and evaluation and synthesis of new and complex ideas.
e) Ability to communicate with the academic and scientific community and society in general about their areas of knowledge in the ways and languages commonly used in the international scientific community.
f) Ability to promote, in academic and professional contexts, scientific, technological, social, artistic or cultural progress in a knowledge-based society.

Admission pathways

Access

In general, to access an official doctorate program you must have an official Spanish bachelor's degree, or equivalent, and a university master's degree and have passed a minimum of 300 ECTS credits in all university degree and master's studies. It can also be accessed by anyone who is in any of these cases:

      
• Be in possession of official Spanish university degrees or equivalent Spanish degrees, provided that at least 300 ECTS credits have been passed in the set of these courses, accrediting level 3 of the Spanish Qualification Framework for Higher Education.

      
• Be in possession of a title obtained in accordance with foreign educational systems belonging to the European Higher Education Area (EEES), without the need for it to be approved, which accredits a level 7 of the European Qualifications Framework, provided that this title is valid for to access doctoral studies in the country of dispatch. This admission does not imply, in any case, the approval of the previous title that the interested party is in possession of or the recognition for other purposes than that of accessing doctoral studies.

      
• Be in possession of a degree obtained in accordance with foreign educational systems outside the EEES, without the need for it to be approved, after verification by the University of Barcelona that this degree accredits a level of training equivalent to the official Spanish master's degree university and which, in the country of dispatch, entitles you to access doctoral studies. This admission does not imply, in any case, the approval of the previous title that the interested party is in possession of or the recognition for other purposes than that of accessing doctoral studies.

      
• Be in possession of another doctoral degree.

      
• Equally, university graduates who, after obtaining a place in training through the corresponding test for access to specialized health training places, have passed with a positive evaluation at least two years of training in a program to obtain the title, can access official of one of the specialties in health sciences.

      
• The graduates, architects or engineers who were in possession of the diploma of advanced studies obtained in accordance with what was established in Royal Decree 778/1998, of April 30, or who had reached the research sufficiency regulated in Royal Decree 185/ 1985, of January 23.

Admission requirements

The admission process is overseen by the Academic Committee of the doctoral programme. Candidates must meet the general access requirements. To request admission, candidates must first submit a completed application and curriculum vitae to the Academic Committee, within the period established by the participating universities. Candidates who have successfully completed the interuniversity master's degree in History of Science: Science, History and Society (UAB and UB) are eligible to access the doctoral programme. Candidates should also have a good working knowledge of English, and of Catalan and Spanish if they are not native speakers of these languages. In specific cases, knowledge of classical Arabic may be required.

Candidates are also assessed on the basis of the following criteria:

¿ Academic record and compatibility of the candidate's studies with the content of the doctoral programme (40%).
¿ Whether the candidate has obtained financial aid and research grants (20%).
¿ Research experience (participation in conferences, publications, involvement in research projects) (10%).
¿ International placements (10%).
¿ Personal interview (20%).

Candidates will be informed of the outcome of their application within fifteen days. They will also be notified of any bridging courses set for them by the Academic Committee, which must be taken during the first year of the programme.

Enrolment

You can find all the information and enrolment prices at the Doctoral School

Lines of research and teaching staff

Research lines

101402 - Astronomy and natural philosophy from the Middle Ages to the scientific revolution
101407 - Arab-Islamic science
101404 - Phisical-mathematical sciences in the contemporany Europe
101400 - The development of mathematical concepts in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. Multicultural mathematics. Alternative views

Research plan and progress reports

You can find all the information at the following links:

    
• Research Plan
   
• Activities document
   
• Annual monitoring report and evaluation

Training activities

Programme-specific training activities  

— Attendance of seminars or conferences presented by experts in their field of knowledge. 

— Presentation of a seminar on the student's research project. 

Other cross-disciplinary training initiatives:  

— Participation in workshops or courses on methodological specialization. 

— Presentations at national and international scientific conferences and congresses.  

— Development of a research article. 

— Mobility placements at external centres specializing in the history of science. 

— Collaboration on research projects.  

Doctoral thesis

Criteria for theses as a collection of publications:  

Theses submitted as a collection of publications must meet the following requirements:  

a) The thesis must include an abstract or synopsis as well as a general introduction to the articles describing the importance of the topic and specifying their objectives.  

b) The thesis must include an overall summary of the results obtained, a discussion of the results, and final conclusions.  

c) A complete copy of the submitted manuscripts must be included, clearly stating the name and affiliation of all co-authors of the articles and the full citation of the publication. If any of the works are in the process of being published, the doctoral candidate must attach proof of acceptance and the full citation of the publication to which they have been submitted.  If any submitted article is the work of co-authors, it is also necessary to include the information specified in paragraph 2.b of this article. Co-authors may not sit on the panel that will evaluate the thesis. 

d) For any submitted article that has been published in a language other than those specified in the doctoral programme, it is necessary to attach an abstract of the article in question written in one of the programme’s languages.  

e) Theses submitted as collections of publications must include at least three publications, and they must have appeared in peer-reviewed research journals and books. The doctoral student must provide the journal's impact and indexing data according to the journal classification systems and citation databases commonly used in the academic field.  The Academic Committee must determine the suitability of the journals based on their impact factor in the area of knowledge. The Academic Committee will evaluate book chapters according to the relative importance of the publisher in the area of knowledge. Of the required publications, a maximum of one may be co-authored, provided that the doctoral student is the first co-author. Each co-author must give written authorization for the use of the article in the thesis in question. 

f) The research plan to be submitted by the doctoral student before the end of the first academic year in which he/she has been admitted to the programme must include a publication plan (timetable and planned journals or publishers), which the Academic Committee of the corresponding line of research must assess during annual follow-up meetings. 

 

2.  For doctoral theses submitted as a collection of published articles, the doctoral student must attach to the request for authorization to deposit the doctoral thesis not only the documents specified in article 35.3 of these regulations, but also the following documents:  

a) A written statement from the thesis supervisors on the impact factor and/or the journal categorization  

of the publications included in the doctoral thesis or the classification of the publishing house  

which published them.   

b) For any submitted article that is the work of co-authors, it is necessary to include a report by the thesis supervisors comprehensively specifying the participation of the doctoral student in each article and justifying if any of the other co-authors of an article have implicitly or explicitly used the article to prepare a doctoral thesis or plan to do so in the future.  

 

3. The publications must be the result of the doctoral student's research plan and, therefore, cannot have been published prior to the official date of admission to the programme (first enrolment for thesis tutoring).   

 

 

Thesis languages: Catalan, Spanish, English, Arabic 

 

Theses subject to data protection regulations: Given the nature of the theses in this field, no special data protection procedures are required. If, in exceptional cases, such a  

need arises, general UB regulations will be applied. 

 

TDX 

Career opportunities

What can you work on ?

The main career opportunities on this PhD programme are as follows:
Academic career in the history of science, technology and medicine.
Science education.
Museology, archives and publishing.
Conservation and management of scientific and cultural heritage.
Scientific communication.
Scientific journalism.
Management of scientific information.
Scientific dissemination.
Scientific terminology.

Contact us

PhD coordination: mforcada@ub.edu

Phone: 934 035 609