State Doctoral Exam - Life Sciences

State Doctoral Examination (SDE)

The State Doctoral Examination has to be conducted prior to the Defence of PhD thesis.

The State Doctoral Examination is organized once a year at the end of the autumn semester.

Students commencing their studies in the autumn semester of 2021 or later are required to undergo the State Doctoral Examination in the third year of their studies. Those enroled in the autumn semester take the SDE in the fifth semester, while students enroled in the spring semester take it in the sixth semester of their studies.

Student submits the Application for the State Doctoral Examination via IS MU with all required annexes at least two months before the planned date of the state exam:

is.muni.cz -> Document Office -> Task submission -> Agenda: PřF ODSKAZINT: Přihláška ke státní doktorské zkoušce/Application for Doctoral State Examination 

The State Doctoral Examination takes place no later than one year from submitting the application unless prevented from taking place due to severe reasons, of which the candidate must be informed.

The members of the Executive Committee of the Doctoral Board designate a board of experts (the Examination Committee - for Life Sciences Program) composed of five and more members - the chairman, members/opponents. At least two members are not in an employment relationship with Masaryk University. The members of the Executive Committee set the date of the examination – based on all members of the Examination Committee's prior consent. 

The State Doctoral Examination is coordinated by the CEITEC Research and Innovations Support Department in cooperation with the Office for Doctoral Studies at the relevant faculty.

Relevant regulation: MU Study and examination regulations, sections 31 – 34.

PROCESS

1. The Executive Committee of the Life Sciences Program, after discussion with the supervisor, will select, with the presented general topics as a starting point, a set of three specific topics for the State Doctoral Examination based on the discussion on completed hard skills courses and in relation to the topic of the thesis.

2. The student is acquainted with the specified topics and, according to his/her choice, prepares a presentation of about 10 minutes for one of them. The presentation will be followed by a discussion on the chosen topic, as well as questions covering the area of the given discipline, based on the syllabus of the topics for the state doctoral examinations.

If a student fails the doctoral state examination, he/she is entitled to repeat the examination no more than once. The Executive Committee of the Doctoral Board should set an alternate date. Suppose a student fails to pass the state examination or a repeated state examination. In that case, his/her studies will be terminated in accordance with section 56, subsection 1, letter b) of the MU Study and examination regulations.

TOPICS