BBMBiomed Doctoral Program Requirements

1. The doctoral student will request authorization from the Academic Commission of the Programme to present the doctoral thesis in "papers-style" format, providing a report from the director(s) of the thesis in which the authorization for such presentation and the approval of the tutor is included. The complete reference of each of the publications must be detailed, indicating the quality indexes of the journals (impact factor and thematic areas) as well as the contribution of the doctoral student to each of the works. In the case of including articles accepted but pending publication, a formal letter of acceptance must be submitted. (Form for the authorization of the Thesis in "papers-style" format).
2. The Academic Commission considers that the number of publications that constitute the body of the thesis in this format is a minimum of three ORIGINAL relevant contributions in which the PhD student is the first author. Reviews will not be considered.
3. The articles must be published or already accepted for publication in specific scientific journals in the area and with international prestige.
4. The articles must form a scientific unit, be integrated for the achievement of the research objective addressed in the Thesis and the dates of submission/publication of the set of articles must show a work process developed as part of the training linked to the doctoral programme.
5. The co-authors of the publications may not be part of the Tribunal in charge of evaluating the Doctoral Thesis.
6. At the time of applying for admission to deposit the thesis, the doctoral candidate will submit a written statement signed by each co-author stating that the articles have not previously been part of any other Doctoral Thesis, that they authorize the presentation of the articles as part of that Doctoral Thesis and the express waiver of each of the co-authors to present such work as part of another Doctoral Thesis at this or any other University.
7. The thesis manuscript must also include unpublished data, corresponding to approximately one third of the work.

• Authorization to use a publication in the Doctoral Thesis.
• Authorization of an author to use several publications

The Thesis presented in this format must be organized with:

1. A general introduction including a review of the current state of the subject and justifying the thematic unity/coherence of the work
2. Objectives of the research
3. Methodology used
4. Publications and unpublished data
5. Integrative discussion of the publications presented
6. Final conclusions
7. Bibliography
8. If applicable, a section of annexes

It is recommended that each of the publications be preceded by a summary of the work and a section indicating the doctoral student's personal contribution to the study.

Article 10.3 of the regulation implementing Royal Decree 99/2011 of 28 January (BOE 10/02/2011), which regulate PhD studies at the UCM, makes reference to the possibility of submitting any of the PhD candidate work published before as an integral part of their thesis:

PhD thesis may be submitted in 'papers-style'. In the papers that make up the Thesis, the PhD candidate must have participated as the main author and will have been published in specialist journals included in indexes of proven quality or similar scientific level in books. The PhD candidate’s director and tutor will certify the nature of the contribution of the PhD candidate in the papers. These compilations must always be accompanied by an introduction that includes a review of the current state of the subject, the objectives and/or hypotheses, an integrative discussion and conclusions. When a PhD Thesis is presented in this format, the permission of other authors included in the papers must be provided

In compliance with Article 13.5 of the aforementioned regulations, ONCE THE PhD THESIS HAS BEEN DEFENDED AND PASSED, the doctoral candidate must send the UCM Library by email (buc_tesi@ucm.es) an authorization from the publishers in which the articles have been published for inclusion in the institutional repository of the UCM.

Use the following link to download the publisher permission request form: biblioteca.ucm.es/tesis-repositorio