PhD Theses an examiners view'

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PhD Theses an examiners view.

• Professor R.L. Baxter
• School of Chemistry
• Edinburgh University

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What is a PhD anyway?

• Acknowledgement by the University and the
  scientific community that you are a specialist in
  your field.
• That you possess a high level of scholarship,
  experimental and analytical skills and scientific
  maturity.
• It is the duty the examiners to ensure that you
  have met these criteria.

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PhD Regulations
The thesis should be a coherent body of work
which constitutes a new and significant
contribution to learning and should contain
material worthy of publication.
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Your thesis shows that

• you have the appropriate level of scholarship in
  your field.
• you have designed and carried out new experiments
  to further knowledge in that area.
• you can analyse your findings and explain them in
  the context of current knowledge.
• you can communicate your results - in writing
  in a professional manner.

Note that your thesis is not a detailed report of
what you did for the past three years.
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Who are the PhD examiners?

• The External Examiner an expert in the
  candidates field of study from another
  institution. Charged with the responsibility to
  ensure that the candidate meets the required
  criteria.
• The Internal Examiner a specialist in a closely
  related field from the candidates host
  institution. Charged with ensuring that the
  candidate meets the requirements of the
  University.
• The Internal Examiner is also responsible for the
  conduct of the oral examination and has
  responsibility to ensure any corrections to the
  thesis are properly executed.

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Duties of the PhD examiners

• To examine the thesis and, where necessary, to
  suggest where corrections or additions are
  required.
• To prepare written reports to the University on
  the quality of the work.
• To conduct the oral examination.

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The examiners expectation of your thesis

• Your introduction will be an up-to-date, but not
  necessarily exhaustive, review of the field of
  study and will focus naturally towards the aims
  and objectives of your work.
• Your results/discussion chapters will describe
  concisely what you did, why you did it and the
  validity and value of your results in the context
  of current knowledge in the field.
• Your experimental section(s) will be sufficiently
  clear detailed to permit an experienced
  scientist (with access to the same literature) to
  repeat your experiments.
• New compounds will be properly characterised and
  new techniques described - at the level required
  by the leading journals in your field.
• Your thesis will be written in clear, objective,
  scientific English and illustrated (where
  necessary) with appropriate schemes and diagrams.
  

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Your External Internal Examiners

• Your examiners are probably extremely busy
  persons
• It takes 2-4 days to read and digest a thesis.
• Your PhD is NOT the most important thing in your
  examiners lives.
• The honorarium is modest or non-existent.

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Pet Hates of PhD Examiners

• Poor use of English.
• Wordy, lengthy theses
• Repetition
• Poor and inappropriate referencing
• Inappropriate use/definition of abbreviations
• References to the Group
• Lack of error calculations.
• Inadequate characterisation of compounds
• Abstracts which arent.

All of these detract from the purpose of the
thesis
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Poor English

• Write in clear, objective, scientific English.

That means no spelling mistakes, proper use of
tenses, correct punctuation. Use the third
person singular. Write in proper sentences
grouped in paragraphs with no missed lines
between paragraphs. Capital letters are reserved
for proper names, Latin Greek terms are
italicized.
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Lengthy Theses
There are very few theses which cant be improved
by making them shorter.
Chemistry theses are typically 120-160 pages.
If yours is longer then there has to be a good
reason.
Avoid repetition at all costs.
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Repetition
This section is about repetition. That is
repeating yourself, a topic which is also
discussed again at the beginning of the next
section (section 4.4.4.4). Let me exemplify this
by discussing the example given in the results
section (section 3.3.3) which clearly
illustrates this point. The graph of boredom
versus number of repetitions (Figure 204a) shows
this effect.
In this plot, which is a log graph, we see that
boredom and the number of times something is
repeated are related. This is a phenomenon which
will tend to occur over and over again,
repeatedly, and will be discussed further in
section 4.4.4.4.
Log boredom
No. of repetitions
Fig. 204a Plot of boredom versus No. of
repetitions showing the dependence of boredom on
repetition and the fact that these are related.
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References
References are not just an afterthought..
All references should be checked several
times. Numbering and formatting must be
consistent.
What references are permissible? On the whole
only papers which appear in peer reviewed
journals are credible. Website addresses are not
generally acceptable except where they are to
well maintained databases. E.g. Cambridge
crystallographic database, Human Genome database.

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Abbreviations
..A complete can of worms. (or a CC of Wms)
Abbreviations (Abs) are a necessary evil but they
can seriously interrupt the comprehension of text
by the reader. Abs should be used sparingly and
non-standard Abs should be avoided if possible.
.. PLs are synthesised in the PM and migrate to
the ER.
Be very careful that you dont introduce more
than are necessary. Define all new abbreviations
in the text and provide a clear and complete list
of abbreviations for the reader to refer to.
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The Group
In our Group special techniques have been
developed for this type of synthesis.. We
decided to .
These are DECIDEDLY DODGY STATEMENTS! And beg
the question Whose PhD is this anyway?
Your research group your peers are however
exceptionally useful as proof readers. However
make sure they do it properly. Bribe or blackmail
them if necessary.
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Errors

• All measurements are attended by errors.
• All tables of data, all graphical representations
  of data and all calculations using that data
  should be accompanied by estimated or calculated
  errors.

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New Compound Characterisation
The criteria for describing a new compound are
normally those accepted by RSC and ACS
journals All spectroscopic data must be
assigned correctly. If it is a solid it should
be crystallised (from a solvent) and subjected to
elemental analysis. In the absence of an
elemental analysis two independent criteria of
purity (e.g. homogeneity by HPLC on two different
systems) and accurate mass MS may be used.
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Abstracts

• Your thesis abstract should describe what is in
  your thesis.
• Check that it is actually an abstract of the
  completed thesis.

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Now. The Oral Examination

• To ensure that the candidate can discuss his/her
  area of study and the results of their studies in
  a knowledgeable and professional manner at a
  level appropriate to the award of the degree.

Can you prepare for this?
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Hostages to Fortune

• Everything you write about in your thesis is
  examinable.
• If you quoted a reference, referred to a
  mechanism or used a technique you can
  realistically be expected to know something about
  it.
• Go through your thesis carefully and list the
  ones you are not sure about. Then learn these (or
  delete any reference to them).

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And finally Who is your external examiner?

• Check out your examiners CV and publication
  history.
• Read some of his/her papers.
• Amend your thesis if necessary.

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You are 2/3 of the way towards your PhD.
There is light at the end of the thesis