Dr. Philos. degree at NMBU

The Dr. Philos. degree (Doctor Philosophiae) is awarded to scholars who have independently qualified for a doctorate without formal supervision. There is no fixed timeframe for this degree, and candidates are not affiliated with the university as doctoral candidates until their application to take the examination for the dr.philos. degree has been approved.

To proceed, you must first complete your Dr. Philos. thesis. When applying to take the Dr. Philos. examination, you need to submit a copy of your finished thesis along with your application. The application should be directed to the faculty that aligns with the thematic focus of your thesis. For contact information at the respective faculties, please refer to: Contact persons during your PhD | NMBU.

Upon approval of your application, you will be officially registered as a doctoral candidate. You will then formally submit your thesis, and an evaluation committee will be appointed.

The Dr. Philos. degree is awarded on the basis of:

An approved scientific thesis
Two approved trial lectures: one on a topic assigned to you and one on a topic of your choice
A satisfactory public defense of the thesis (disputation)

Please note that the Dr. Philos. thesis is an independent scientific work. The university does not provide financial support, guidance, or any other assistance during the process.

A Dr. Philos. thesis

The thesis must address a topic relevant to one of NMBU's academic fields. Below, you will find the requirements for a Dr. Philos. thesis, as well as the prohibitions, as outlined in NMBU's Dr. Philos. regulations.

Thesis requirements
Section 6.1 outlines the requirements for the thesis.

(1) The thesis must approach a subject with relevance to one of NMBU’s fields of research.

(2) The thesis shall be an independent, scientific work that fulfils international standards and is
of high academic quality in terms of the formulation of research questions, the specification of
concepts, the methodological, theoretical and empirical basis, documentation, the use of
literature and the form of presentation.

(3) The thesis must be on the same academic level as a PhD thesis, but the scope of the
thesis must be considerably more extensive. The thesis shall contribute to the development of
new scientific knowledge and must be of sufficiently high academic quality to merit publication
as part of the scientific literature in the field.

(4) As a main rule works that are more than ten years old cannot be used as part of the thesis. In
cases where such works are included an assessment of these sub-component(s) connection to the thesis, and how they have provided new knowledge to the subject area, shall be included in the request to have the work evaluated.

(5) The thesis may consists of several shorter pieces of work (manuscripts or papers) if there
is a connection between the pieces of work and this connection is made clear.

(6) Theses that include co-authored pieces of work must be accompanied by co-declaration(s)
describing the candidate’s contribution to each piece of work.

(7) The NMBU guidelines for the use of authors’ addresses must be used for co-authored pieces of work included in the doctoral degree work.

(8) A single thesis may be submitted by more than one candidate, for joint evaluation, provided
that the contribution of each candidate can be clearly identified and the extent of each of the
contributions equals one thesis.

(9) The thesis must be written in Norwegian, Swedish, Danish or English. A Dr. Philos. candidate
who wishes to use another language must apply for permission to do so upon submission of the
thesis. The decision is made by the faculty.

(10) The thesis must be publicly available.

Work not eligible for evaluation
Section 6.2 outlines work not eligible for evaluation.

(1) A work, or parts of a work, that has been approved as the basis for previous examinations or
degrees will not be eligible for evaluation. Nevertheless, data, analyses or methods from previous degrees may be used as the basis for a Dr. Philos. thesis.

(2) A work, or parts of a work, that has been evaluated and accepted or found ineligible for
defence for a degree at a Norwegian or foreign educational institution, is not eligible for
evaluation even if the work is in a revised form.

(3) A work, or parts of a work, that is under evaluation for the doctoral degree at another
Norwegian or foreign university may not simultaneously be submitted for evaluation at NMBU.

Whats the meaning of the phrases 'independent scientific work' and 'the scope of the thesis must be considerably more extensive'?
The phrase 'The thesis shall be an independent, scientific work…' essentially means that the work is conducted without supervision or follow-up from the degree-granting institution. As a doctoral candidate (Dr. Philos. candidate), you are responsible for the research underlying the thesis to a significant extent.
The introductory section/cover of an article-based thesis must be authored solely by you. However, you can include co-authors on manuscripts or published articles that are part of the thesis. In such cases, you must attach "co-author statements" demonstrating how you have taken sufficient responsibility for the research and writing. The extent of sufficient responsibility will be assessed by the evaluation committee based on their knowledge and experience.

The phrase 'the scope of the thesis must be considerably more extensive' can, as a rule of thumb for article-based thesis, be at least 6-8 manuscripts/articles. However, the number and extent of manuscripts and (published) articles can vary widely, so the evaluation committee must always assess the overall scope of the research represented by the thesis.

How to apply?

Application to present oneself for the Dr. Philos. examination, should be addressed and submitted to the faculty corresponding to the thematic area of the thesis. There is no specific application form; instead, you are required to compose a formal letter and send it via email to post@nmbu.no along with the faculty's PhD advisor(s).

Together with the application, you must hand in the following:

a. One paper-based copy of the thesis, and one electronic version (PDF) of the thesis*);
b. Documentation of previous education (master's degree)
c. A list of previous scientific works / publications (these must be available upon request);
and if relevant
d. Documentation of residence permit in Norway
e. Documentation that the thesis has association to Norway (applies to non-Nordic citizens)

*) The Dr. Philos. regulations state that only "One bound or booklet paper copy of the thesis" must accompany the application. For practical reasons, you should attach an electronic copy when you send the application by e-mail, and send the paper version to the faculty's postal address:

Faculty of …
PhD advisor NN
PO Box 5003 NMBU
1432 Ås

Tips for applicants
Feel free to include in the application the declarations you are asked to provide, and the attachments that are mandatory for the formal submission of the thesis, this makes the whole process go faster:

- Declaration as to whether the thesis is submitted for assessment for the first or second time;
- Declaration that the thesis has not been submitted for assessment at another institution;
- Declaration that all or parts of the thesis have not previously been assessed by another Norwegian or foreign institution;

and if it is relevant to your research/thesis
- Documentation that the necessary permits have been obtained;
- Co-authorship declarations for all manuscripts or published articles that have multiple authors.

If you are a foreign citizen, permission to produce can be granted if the applicant has a residence permit in Norway, or if at least one of these criteria is met:

- the thesis deals with a theme or is based on material that has a direct connection to Norway, or
- the thesis has a strong connection to Norwegian research in the subject area, or
- the doctoral work has been carried out during a stay at a Norwegian university or research institute, or in particular contact with Norwegian researchers.

Submission of the thesis
The formal submission of the thesis only takes place after your application has been processed and given that it has been approved.
If the faculty allows you to prepare for a Dr. Philos. evaluation, you must submit
- a. Five bound or booklet copies of the thesis (to be sent by mail or delivered by hand);
- b. One identical electronic version (PDF) (to be uploaded into the NMBU open archive);
...and in addition these items if not delivered previously:
- c. Declaration as to whether the thesis is submitted for assessment for the first or second time;
- d. Declaration that the thesis has not been submitted for assessment at another institution;
- e. Declaration that all or parts of the thesis have not previously been assessed by another Norwegian or foreign institution;
- f. Documentation that all necessary authorizations have been secured (if relevant to your research work)
- g. Declaration of co-authorship by all co-authors (if relevant to your research work)

Appointment of an evaluation committee

Following the faculty approval of the application to submit the thesis for evaluation, the rector appoints an expert committee to evaluate the thesis, the trial lectures and the disputation. The evaluation committee must consist of minimum three members and is appointed on basis of a proposal from the faculty. The Public Administration Act section 6 on Partiality will apply to all committee members.

The proposal must explain the reasoning behind the selection of members and indicate how the committee as a whole covers the subject area(s) addressed in the thesis.

Evaluation of the thesis

Within three months after receiving the thesis, the evaluation committee submits a recommendation to the faculty, with individual statements about whether the work is worthy of being defended for the Dr. Philos. degree. The recommendation and any dissenting opinions must be justified in the report.

The faculty will inform you about the recommendation and the candidate will be granted 10 working days to present written comments to the report. If you do not wish to put forward comments, the faculty must be notified of this in writing as soon as possible.

You must send any comments you have to the faculty via the PhD advisor. If the comments may have an impact on whether the thesis can be approved, the evaluation committee should consider the comments before the faculty makes a substantive decision on the matter.

If the committee’s recommendation is unanimous, the faculty will make its decision in accordance with the unanimous recommendation.

If the committee’s recommendation is splitted, the faculty will bring the dissent to rector.

What if the thesis is not approved for public defence?

A thesis that once has been rejected may be evaluated in a new version, either as the only work or as one of several connected works, at the earliest six months after the faculty has rejected the thesis.

A new evaluation can only take place once.

Trial lectures and public defence of the thesis

If the thesis is found worthy of public defence, you will be requested to give two public trial lectures, one with a chosen topic and one with a specified topic.

The evaluation committee assesses the trial lectures. Both trial lectures must be evaluated as passed before the public defence can be held.

Conferral of the degree, diploma

On the basis of the faculty’s report that the thesis, the trial lectures and the public defence have been approved, the rector will confer the degree of Dr. Philos. to the candidate.

The diploma will be issued by NMBUs Department of Research and Innovation.

Appeal

Rejection of an application for evaluation of a doctoral thesis and a decision of non-approval of
a doctoral thesis, trial lectures or public defence may be appealed pursuant to the Act relating to
universities and university colleges section 4-13 and following of the Public Administration Act
section 28.

Forms

Forms relevant to a Dr. Philos. candidate:

There is no separate application form for presentation for the Dr. Philos. degree. The application has the form of a letter addressed directly to the relevant faculty. Send the letter by e-mail to post@nmbu.no and the faculty's PhD advisor(s), see Contact persons NMBU's research training.