Procedure

2. Composition of the Thesis Advisory Committee (TAC) 

Guidelines for the Thesis Advisory Committee (TAC) meeting 

In general, the following applies (individual doctorate and doctorate with TAC from a doctoral program):

The TAC consists of 3 members:

• 2 members are members of the Combined Faculty
• 1 of which is a member of the Faculty of Engineering Sciences

The supervisor is a member of the TAC. The member of the Faculty of Engineering Sciences is a professor of the faculty and represents the doctoral candidate's corresponding doctoral subject. He/she agrees to prepare the Gutachten (written report) for the defense. The professorial member of the faculty also chairs the examination for the defense.
Please note that the TAC members should also be members of your examination board later on.

Procedure for the change of a TAC member

In the event that the composition of your TAC changes, please send an e-mail to the doctoral office with the following content and name your supervisor and the new TAC member in the cc:

Salutation
I would like to inform you about the change in the composition of my TAC: 
Mr./Mrs. Name outgoing TAC member will be replaced by Mr./Mrs. Name new TAC member.
The change has been agreed with my supervisor.

Special features of the doctoral program with TAC

The TAC of the doctoral program can still be used if 1 member from the TAC is from the Faculty of Engineering Sciences. (see above).

Please see the file “TAC Documentation” in our Forms & Downloads page for further information.

3. Registration on the online portal heiDOCS

Please register on the following website:

If you wish to join our faculty and already have a heiDOCS file, a new heiDOCS file must be created for our faculty. You will need a different e-mail address from the one you used to register on heiDOCS.

4. Document submission

For the doctoral committee that decides on your admission, we would need the following documents from you:

Please note: always use the most recent versions of the forms on the website “Forms & Downloads”

•     Form Application for Admission as a Doctoral Candidate in original with original signatures.
• Form Agreement on Doctoral Studies in original with original signatures
• Copy of a photo ID that clearly shows your first and last name and place of birth
• Certified copy of your Master's degree certificate
• Certified copy of your Master's transcript of records
• Certified copy of your Bachelor's degree certificate
• Certified copy of your Bachelor's transcript of records
• Form Excel inquiry PhD student
• Resume

Please send all the above documents to me in PDF format. Please send the form “Excel Inquiry PhD student” separately as an Excel file. I will review your documents and get back to you shortly.

If your diplomas were not issued in English or German, official translations are required.

Please name your PDF files as follows:
- SURNAME_Application for admission as a doctoral candidate
- SURNAME_Doctoral agreement
- SURNAME_ID card
- SURNAME_Master's certificate
- SURNAME_Overview of Master's grades 
- SURNAME_Bachelor's certificate
- SURNAME_Overview of Bachelor's grades

The agreement on doctoral studies is signed in three copies. One copy for the advisor, one for the doctoral candidate, and one remains with the doctoral file in the faculty.

The signatures on the agreement must all be original on the printed form. Electronic signatures cannot be accepted. Please submit the original Application for Admission as a Doctoral Candidate and the Agreement on Doctoral Studies forms to the Dean's Office.

In justified exceptional cases, the Agreement on Doctoral Studies may be sent in advance with an electronic signature. However, the original signature of your advisor must be submitted at the latest upon arrival in Heidelberg. In this case, we request that your advisor sends us the Agreement on Doctoral Studies by e-mail to: promotion-ing@uni-heidelberg.de.

Only complete applications can be processed.

After successful admission by the faculty, the status of your heiDOCS file will change to “accepted” (step 4). After step 4 is done, we ask you to complete steps 5a “Research Phase” and 5b “General Conditions” in a timely manner.

1. Please upload the following documents to Heibox:

• Application for admission to the doctoral examination in accordance with the doctoral regulations of the Joint Faculty of Mathematics, Engineering and Natural Sciences
• Two electronic versions of your dissertation (as described in the application form)
• TAC reports
• Curriculum vitae including your nationality, date and place of birth, and affiliation with the institute

A submission appointment can only be scheduled once all documents have been uploaded to Heibox.

2. For your in-person submission appointment, please bring the following:

• Two hard copies of your dissertation
  (Please ensure that the university or institute logo is not used. The dissertation must be bound in A4 format. Further details can be found in § 7 of the doctoral regulations of the Joint Faculty.)
• The original application form with original signatures:
  Application for admission to the doctoral examination in accordance with the doctoral regulations of the Joint Faculty of Mathematics, Engineering and Natural Sciences

Once you have submitted your application and two hard copies of your dissertation to the Doctoral Office, the 8-week processing period begins.
Please note: Closures of the Doctoral Office will be added to the 8-week period.

After submitting your application for admission to the examination process, the proposed examination committee and defense date will be submitted to the Doctoral Committee for approval.
You will receive a response from the Doctoral Office once the Doctoral Committee has reviewed and approved (or amended) your proposed committee and date.

Information on Plagiarism Check:

In line with recommendations from the Rectorate, the Faculty of Engineering Sciences has decided to enable reviewers to conduct an automated plagiarism check as part of the dissertation review process. The results of this check will be considered in the evaluation of your dissertation. In case of doubt, the matter will be forwarded to the Doctoral Committee.

The plagiarism check is conducted using Turnitin. To facilitate this check, please send a separate PDF file of the identical text of your dissertation—excluding the cover page, table of contents, and bibliography—together with the electronic version of your dissertation to the Dean’s Office.

Turnitin’s terms of use are compliant with the EU General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR), effective May 25, 2018. While Turnitin offers the option to archive submitted documents for future comparison, the Faculty of Engineering Sciences does not use this feature. Your file will be promptly deleted from Turnitin after the plagiarism report has been created.

After the Doctoral Examination:

Once you have successfully defended your dissertation, the Doctoral Office will begin preparing the documents for your doctoral certificate.
Please note that it may take several weeks before the certificate is issued by the Joint Faculty and signed by the Rector.

For this process, a proof of publication is required:

The original form of the Proof of Publication, signed by both you and the University Library, must be submitted to the Doctoral Office.
The certificate can only be issued once the original proof of publication has been received.

Important:
Regardless of the publication option selected on the “Proof of Publication” form, you must submit one stamped copy of your dissertation to the University Library, stamped by the Doctoral Office.

This stamped copy can be picked up from the Doctoral Office by appointment only after your defense and once the official examination record of your defense is on file with the Doctoral Office.
(Please allow approximately one week after the defense for the document to be processed and available.)

Contact details for the University Library:
https://www.ub.uni-heidelberg.de/allg/profil/anschrift.html

The original reviews prepared by your reviewers are to be submitted to the following address:

Doctoral Committee of the Faculty of Engineering
Berliner Straße 45
69120 Heidelberg

In order to meet the deadlines, an electronic version of the review can be sent to promotion-ing@uni-heidelberg.de in advance. However, this does not replace sending the original by mail.

2. Examination

Date: There must be at least 8 weeks between submitting your dissertation to the Dean's Office and the defense. As a rule, dissertations cannot be submitted on Fridays. Please discuss a suitable examination date with your examination board and arrange for a suitable room in which your defense can take place. 
Please also note that the Dean's Office is closed for two weeks in August and between Christmas and January 1.
Room: The examination must take place in a room at Heidelberg University or an affiliated research institution in Heidelberg. The university institutes are open for examinations. Please arrange a room in which your defense will take place in good time. To do so, please contact the respective institute's secretariat and make a binding reservation for the room. If you are giving a computer presentation, you must take care of the technical aspects such as the availability of a projector, program compatibility, etc. A blackboard is desirable.
Public: You decide whether doctoral students from the faculty may attend your presentation. You can indicate this in the application for the examination procedure. The examination interview is not open to the public.

Procedure: The defense is chaired by the chair of the examination committee. It should last at least one hour and no more than one and a half hours. The defense begins with your 20-30 minute presentation on the dissertation topic. You are free to choose the media (blackboard, projector, etc.) for this purpose. This is followed by 20-30 minutes of questions about your work and 20-30 minutes of discussion and more general questions. The defense covers topics that are factually or methodologically related to the dissertation, as well as questions about the doctoral subject in general.
Following a successful defense, you will be given a certificate of passing the doctoral examination, signed by the chair of the examination committee.

Time constraints

Please make sure that you submit your dissertation with the required documents to the doctoral office at least 8 weeks before your oral examination together with the confirmed date of your defense. If the doctoral office is closed, you must add these periods to the 8-week lead time for submission; however, you may schedule your defense examination during these times. The 8 weeks is a minimum deadline, you are welcome to submit more than 8 weeks before the defense. Closing times of the doctoral office: 08.08.2025 - 22.08.2025

Dissertation

The dissertation must be written in German or English. A German and an English abstract of the most important results are to precede the actual text. (§ 7 paragraph 3 Gesamtpromotionsordnung)

The dissertations to be submitted must be made of age-resistant, wood- and acid-free paper and be bound in a durable manner. It is not permitted to use the seal of Heidelberg University on the cover or in the dissertation.

Cumulative Dissertation

Cumulative dissertations are possible in exceptional cases and require the approval of the doctoral committee. They are not possible in the Matter to Life doctoral degree program. (Regarding § 7 paragraph 2 Gesamtpromotionsordnung)