Doctoral dissertation

When examining a dissertation or a Licentiate thesis, particular consideration should be given to the following:

1. The topic and its originality
2. The quality of the research material and its applicability to investigating the matter under discussion
3. The research methods and their reliability. Has the work required the use of methods which examine the problem under scrutiny in a new way, or the creation of completely new methods?
4. The reliability and scientific significance of the observations. Do the research results support previous observations, or does the research feature completely new observations?
5. Are the conclusions reliable, and can the author contrast his or her own observations with previous research? Particular attention should be paid to the significance of the conclusions with respect to opening new perspectives in the field of the dissertation.
6. Does the author display a command of the field and a familiarity with the literature?
7. Are the overall composition (the relative scope and logical organisation of the literature review and the sections discussing the material, methods, etc.), presentation, style, language and layout appropriate for the dissertation?

A grade of Pass with Distinction requires that the results of the research bear international significance and that the included observations and conclusions are new and greatly change previously held notions or clinical practices. If the student conducted the research as a member of a group, indisputable proof of his or her independent contribution is required.

According to Rector’s decision (HY/11925/00.00.06.00/2024), a doctoral dissertation must consist of peer-reviewed scholarly publications or manuscripts accepted for publication, as well as a summarising report on the said documents (an article-based dissertation); or it must be a scholarly work in the name of the doctoral candidate alone and based on previously unpublished research results (a monograph). The doctoral dissertation may also take the form of another work that meets the appropriate scientific criteria, provided that the doctoral candidate’s independent contribution to it can be verified. 

All doctoral dissertations should meet the following scholarly criteria:
they must

1. contain new scientific knowledge
2. demonstrate critical thinking on the doctoral candidate’s part
3. demonstrate profound familiarity with the field
4. demonstrate mastery of research methods and their application
5. be scientifically convincing
6. contain justified results, and
7. demonstrate scientific integrity and adhere to the ethical norms of research.

The supervisor and the doctoral candidate must limit the topic and content of the dissertation in such a way that the degree can be completed in four years of full-time study.

The doctoral dissertation must have a brief abstract of one to two pages, providing a summary of the dissertation and its key results. The abstract must outline the doctoral candidate’s objectives or research questions as well as the core research methods, results and conclusions.

Monograph dissertations

A monograph dissertation is a scholarly work issued under the name of the writer alone and based on independent research. Previously published work shall not be accepted as a monograph. Before completing the dissertation proper, however, the author of a monograph may publish articles on related topics and refer to these in the dissertation. Direct quotes from the dissertation cannot be published later under a research group. The length of a monograph dissertation is normally maximum 250 pages, including appendices and the list of references. Supervisors of monographs must take particular care to ensure the quality of the manuscript before it is submitted for preliminary examination.

Article-based dissertations

An article-based dissertation typically comprises 2-3 peer-reviewed scholarly articles related to a single topic and a summarising report which is considered the dissertation proper. The number of articles depends on the extent, the scientific quality and significance of the articles, the publishing forum, as well as, the own contribution of the writer. If the number of original articles is small (1), special attention is paid to high quality of the research and the amount of work done. In addition, the doctoral candidate is to indicate their significant contribution in the original articles of the dissertation with a report signed by the candidate and their supervisor. The report is to be more detailed than usually (with the accuracy of each individual test/experiment or analysis).

The doctoral candidate writes the summarising report, which is a synthesis of the articles in the dissertation including the literary review. The summarising report of an article-based dissertation must present the background, objectives, methods, material, results, discussion and conclusions of the research. The summarising report must be a balanced work based on both the publications included in the dissertation and the research literature.

In any co-authored publications, the doctoral candidate’s independent contribution must be clearly identifiable. For this purpose, the doctoral candidate, the supervisor and the advisory committee, if any, draft a free-form report on the participation of the doctoral candidate at each stage of the research work. If the co-authored publication has been used in another dissertation, this must be mentioned in the report. The doctoral candidate should deliver the draft of the report on his or her contribution also to the other authors of the publication. The doctoral candidate shall deliver the report to the faculty when submitting the dissertation for preliminary examination and to the preliminary examiners, opponent and custos at a later date.

In case one or more of the articles have been previously used in some earlier dissertation, this information must be added to the end of the “List of original publications”.

Retaining the original research material

The author must retain the original research results pertaining to the dissertation at least as long as the processing of the dissertation at the Faculty is underway. The results must be presented to the Faculty or to Faculty-appointed assessors on request.

The examination process of doctoral dissertations comprises the following:

1. preliminary examination
2. permission to print the dissertation and defend it at a public examination
3. the public examination
4. approval of the dissertation.

Pre­lim­in­ary ex­am­in­a­tion instructions in detail can be found Instructions for students' article Faculty of Medicine: submitting the doctoral thesis

When the dissertation manuscript is complete, the doctoral candidate must apply for its preliminary examination from the Faculty Council.

Article-based dissertations that contain an incomplete summarising report cannot be submitted for preliminary examination, but the matter can be suspended until the summarising report is polished or revised.

At the proposal of the supervising professor (or the supervising person), the Faculty Council will appoint two preliminary examiners, normally from Finland, who are familiar with the field of the dissertation. The preliminary examiners will issue a statement on the dissertation manuscript to the Faculty Council for the purpose of granting the permission to print and defend the dissertation.

Permission to print and defend the dissertation requires supporting statements from the preliminary examiners as well as information on the opponent, custos, and grading committee member.

Once the preliminary examiners have submitted their supporting statements, the Faculty Council will grant permission to print and defend the dissertation and will appoint the opponent and custos at the proposal of the supervising professor (or the supervising person). One of the Faculty professors will serve as custos. The opponent must be a professor or docent (or have equivalent scientific qualifications) in one of the fields of research of the Faculty of Medicine of the University of Helsinki or in a neighbouring field. The opponent must be from outside the faculty and, as a rule, from outside the University of Helsinki. The same principles of disqualification apply to both preliminary examiners and opponents. The opponent must not be involved in the dissertation research or in any co-authored publications with the author of the dissertation. He or she must be from a different division, clinic or research programme than the dissertation supervisor and the doctoral candidate. He or she must not represent the division, clinic, research programme or equivalent organisation where the dissertation has been registered, and he or she must not have cooperated with the dissertation supervisor closely or recently (in the last three years). A preliminary examiner can be appointed as opponent if the reasons are justified. The dissertation supervisors or thesis committee members cannot serve as opponents.

The doctoral candidate must agree on a time for the public examination with the custos and the opponent.

Further information on publishing an electronic dissertation can be found in the article Publishing the dissertation and communications. The doctoral candidate and dissertation supervisor should pay attention to the following: if the thesis submitted to E-thesis contains unpublished results to be included in an original article, the online publishing of the thesis may hamper the publication of the results. In this case, the doctoral candidate and supervisor should consider postponing the publishing of the dissertation in E-thesis until all results to be included in original articles have been published.

Rector has decided on some changes in the dissertation grading. As of 1 March 2019, the new grading practice will commence. Please note, that the practice does not apply to dissertations already submitted for preliminary examination process.

According to the Rector’s decision, one or two faculty representatives will be appointed for the public examination at the discretion of the Faculty Council. The Council will decide on the matter when granting the permission to proceed to public examination, or should this not be possible, delegate the decision making to the Dean.

At the Faculty of Medicine as a rule, with the introduction of this reformation, grade is proposed by the opponent and custos. If custos is also the supervisor, the custos will find a new faculty representative. Faculty representatives must be professors or docents of the University of Helsinki or members of the university's teaching and research staff with the academic qualifications of a docent. The faculty representative(s) must be well acquainted with the grading criteria and regulations related to the examination of doctoral theses in use at the University of Helsinki.

Opponent and the faculty representative will propose a grade for the dissertation. The statements must assess both the quality of the dissertation and the doctoral candidate’s success in defending it at the public examination, thus, the faculty representative is to be present at the public defense. The preliminary examiners’ statements will also be taken into consideration when assessing the dissertation.

At the Faculty of Medicine, the faculty representative is appointed in the preliminary examination form. Thus, in the future, doctoral candidates are to give information in the form of their preliminary examiners, opponent, custos, and faculty representative, whether it is the custos or someone else from the faculty.

The Faculty Council will decide on the approval of the dissertation and on the grade awarded. The Faculty applies a two-tier grading scale: Pass and Pass with Distinction. The latter grade is given only to dissertations of an exceptionally high standard and cannot be granted to more than ten per cent of dissertations approved by the Faculty.

Opponent's travelling

Travel reservations must be made through the Faculty's secretaries, so that in the event of cancellations, the university's travel insurance will cover the expenses incurred. The doctoral researcher, supervisor or opponent can contact the secretaries directly regarding travel bookings (grp-ltdk-sihteerit@helsinki.fi).

The supervisor's unit will cover the opponent's travel and accommodation expenses as follows (if the supervisor is not employed by the university, the expenses are covered by the custos' unit):

• Flight: Finland max €300, Europe max €750, non-European country max €1250 (economy class)

• Buses, taxis, etc.: According to the universities travel guidelines. Any taxi or bus trips will be paid afterwards to the opponent with a travel expense report with relevant receipts. Opponents will be provided with the travel expense form when they are sent instructions on the public defence.

• We recommend using public transport instead of a taxi whenever possible. The easiest way to buy a public transport ticket is with the HSL application, where you can also download receipts for the travel invoice.

• We recommend ordering taxis in Helsinki by phone, using an app or through the hotel reception. In this way, we make sure that the taxis are reliable service providers, whose prices are reasonable, and you also get a receipt for the trip. On the travel invoice, you are to write the routes taken by taxi.

• Should the opponent use their own car for the journey, the costs will be reimbursed according to the cheapest public means of transport for the corresponding journey, not with kilometre allowances. A print of the fares is to be included with the travel expense form.

• The Faculty will not cover any parking costs.

• Accommodation: max 2 nights in a hotel according to the university's travel guidelines/ (reasonably priced accommodation, no suites, no the most expensive hotels). If the Faculty’s secretaries are not used to book the hotel, we will reimburse a maximum of 150 euros per night against receipts.

The doctoral researcher’s supervisor pays the remaining travel and accommodation expenses of the opponent. If the supevisor does not have funds or is not employed by the university, the selection of the opponent and the covering of expenses must be agreed with the head of the unit in advance.

To be noted:

• Flights must be booked as soon as the date of the public defence is known or no later than one month before the public defence. Additional costs arising from flights booked too late will be paid from the funds of the supervisor or the research team.

• The opponent sends a travel invoice with attachments for other possible expenses (bus, taxi) to the address meilahti-phd@helsinki.fi, where the invoice is checked and forwarded to financial services for payment. The travel invoice form is sent to the opponent along with other instructions by e-mail when the dissertation process begins.

DOCTOR RESEARCHER: University of Helsinki's contract hotels, travel guide and travel booking system can be found in Flamma.

Dissertation hall and dissertation ceremony

The Faculty of Medicine pays the opponent's fee and the hall rent for the dissertation. If the dissertation meeting is organized in the premises of the University of Helsinki and the adjacent lobby or the Faculty Club of BM 1 is used for the coffee meeting, the 2-hour reservation will be placed in the same room reservation and the faculty will pay for it. If the coffee event is organized elsewhere, the faculty does not cover the space rent. Please note that HUS premises are not university premises and the faculty does not reimburse the rent of these.

In principle, the public defence is to be always organized in Helsinki at the premises of the university or HUS. If you want to organize the event in another location, you must agree with the faculty in advance. Independently managed arrangements can lead to the postponement of the public defence.

The doctoral researcher pays for the coffee service held after the dissertation conference. The faculty does not pay any catering costs related to the public defence ceremony.

The opponent's coat costs are not reimbursed from the unit's funds, incl. possible own project financing.

The university does not compensate the opponent's meals or pay any daily allowance in connection with the defence.

You can ask for reference information at meilahti-phd@helsinki.fi

You can get more information about expense billing from Tuomas Hurri, tuomas.hurri@helsinki.fi