Welcome to the Doctoral Center for Environment and Technology

The distinctive interdisciplinarity as well as the broad expertise of the 17 professors involved from the two departments of Water, Environment, Building and Safety as well as Engineering and Industrial Design constitute the particular strength of the university's own Doctoral Center.

The subject-related core in the WUBS department lies in the analysis and assessment of water management and environmental processes; the subject-related core in the IWID department lies in the development of technology-related processes and the creation of products and innovative manufacturing technologies. The subject-related core of the Doctoral Center Environment and Technology is to combine these natural processes and the technical solutions into innovative processes and developments.

For the doctorate, there are research-strong supervisors from several subject areas. Doctoral students can choose between the following research areas and thus place their topic precisely:

1. water management

a) Hydrology and Hydrostatistics
b) Environmental and hydrochemistry
c) Ecology of floodplains and river floodplains
d) Integrated and transboundary water resources management
e) river restoration, near-natural hydraulic engineering and hydrobiology
f) Flood protection and flood risk management
g) hydraulic engineering and hydraulic testing
h) engineering ecology

2. urban and industrial water management and waste management
a) Wastewater discharge and treatment
b) treatment of organic residues
c) drinking water production, treatment and distribution
d) industrial symbiosis

3. climate change

a) Hydrological extreme events, including floods, flash floods and low flows
b) Intersectoral assessments of climate change impacts
c) Adaptation concepts, ecologically oriented planning, environmental assessment and ecological monitoring
d) Green infrastructure and nature-based solutions
e) Importance of water bodies and wetlands for different climate regions
f) Climate change and road construction - impacts and adaptation strategies

4. industry 4.0, automation and human-technology interaction

a) Planning, creation and use of automation systems
b) Digital cross-domain engineering, digital twin, virtual commissioning
c) Non-destructive testing methods for mechanical and civil engineering
d) Lightning protection, high current and high voltage test engineering
e) Human-Technology Interaction, Assistance Systems
f) Biomechanics
g) Motion analysis, optimization and support
h) Smart home / ambient-assisted living

5. renewable energy systems and energy technology

a) Renewable energy generation and conversion
b) Cross-sector energy storage incl. electromobility
c) Operation and control of multi-energy grids and systems including smart grid, virtual power plants incl. energy plants, storage and consumers, concepts, algorithms and tools

6. novel construction materials and resource recovery

a) Further development of road construction materials, esp. asphalt
b) Alternative binders from renewable resources
c) Integrated resource management and nexus approach
d) Recovery of resources from residual materials, including nutrients, energy, construction materials
e) Mineral substitute building materials
f) Land recycling incl. renaturation and revitalization

7. innovative manufacturing processes

a) Technology development of joining processes, including precision friction welding, joining of innovative mixed material joints
b) Technology development of precision machining, e.g. production of defined workpiece surfaces by finish machining
c) Development of process combinations on standard machine tools, e.g. grinding-finishing, hard turning-finishing, milling-finishing
d) Further development of machine and system technology with focus on CNC power-controlled processes
e) Production and process measurement technology
f) material testing methods

8. data analysis and modeling and decision support systems

a) Data analysis, modeling and forecasting of natural and engineered systems.
b) Data mining of environmental and engineering information
(c) machine learning in large data sets and artificial intelligence applications
(d) Simulation of water and piping systems, groundwater flow and transport, environmental engineering facilities, and ecological systems
e) Simulation and risk assessment of natural hazards and NaTech events.
f) Development of prognosis models in civil engineering especially road damages
g) Asset management and condition monitoring of infrastructures

You have an idea for a dissertation topic in the field of environment and technology and are interested in a doctorate at a university of applied sciences in Saxony-Anhalt? Then read through the doctoral regulations of the doctoral center. Then look for a supervisor among the professors of the Doctoral Center Environment and Technology who would like to supervise the topic. The best way to do this is to make an appointment for a consultation with the potential supervisor to present the topic.

Next, request the necessary application documents from the advisor, Ms. Kerstin Tänzer (kerstin.taenzer@h2.de). You will complete the Acceptance Application, enter into a supervision agreement with the primary supervising person, and prepare an exposé of the dissertation project.

The application must be sent by mail and digitally to the Center Director for the attention of Kerstin Tänzer.

Address:

Magdeburg-Stendal University of Applied Sciences
Doctoral Center Environment and Technology
for the attention of Kerstin Tänzer
Breitscheidstraße 2
39114 Magdeburg

Interest

Do you have an idea for a dissertation topic in the field of environment and technology? Are you interested in doing a doctorate at a university of applied sciences in Saxony-Anhalt? Please contact Kerstin Tänzer, the advisor of the PhD Center, for individual advice!

Inform

Read the doctoral regulations of the Doctoral Center (see "Documents"). They form the legal basis for all doctoral studies and regulate, among other things, the rights and duties of doctoral students.
If you have any questions regarding the doctoral regulations, please feel free to contact Kerstin Tänzer.

Search for a supervisor

Look for a supervisor among the professors of the Doctoral Center Environment and Technology who would like to supervise the topic. It is best to make an appointment with the potential supervisor to present the topic, the preliminary research question and the relevance. In addition, another person may be the secondary supervisor, even if he or she is not a member of the Doctoral Center Environment and Technology. Please inform yourself about the conditions for a second supervision in the doctoral regulations under § 7 para. 2.

Request application forms

The application forms are available upon request from the advisor, Ms. Kerstin Tänzer.

Exposé

Write an exposé outlining your planned research project. Use the exposé instructions as a guideline (see "Documents") and consult with your supervisor. Also conclude a supervision agreement with your supervisor. This document is part of the application forms that you will receive from the advisor of the PhD Center, Ms. Kerstin Tänzer.

Application
Fill out the acceptance application and the survey form for the doctoral statistics and enclose the supervision agreement, the exposé and the other required documents. The application should be sent by mail and digitally to:
Magdeburg-Stendal University of Applied Sciences
Doctoral Center Environment and Technology
Attn: Kerstin Tänzer
Breitscheidstraße 51
39114 Magdeburg
kerstin.taenzer@h2.de

Examination of your documents

Your documents will be checked for completeness before the meeting of the doctoral committee in which your acceptance as a doctoral candidate will be decided. We will contact you if any documents are still needed.

Acceptance at the Doctoral Center

The doctoral committee decides on your acceptance as a doctoral candidate at the doctoral center. If necessary, you will be admitted with conditions that you should fulfill in the course of your doctoral studies. You will be informed about the decision by e-mail.

Enrolment

You can enrol as a doctoral student at Magdeburg-Stendal University of Applied Sciences after acceptance at the doctoral center, if desired. It is possible to take a leave of absence for individual semesters for health reasons, pregnancy/maternity leave, parental leave, caring for close relatives, and in the case of extraordinary stress during employment.

Writing your dissertation

You write your dissertation on the basis of the synopsis. Basically, you have the choice to write a monograph or to write a cumulative dissertation. A monograph is a coherent scientific work (equivalent to a book). To do a PhD cumulatively means that you publish three closely related scientific papers in recognized journals and write a summary text for them. Consider with your advisor which model is a better fit for your dissertation project. Adhere to the principles of good scientific practice when researching and writing.
A doctorate takes an average of four to five years to complete. After five years, the doctoral committee decides whether to continue with the doctoral program. You may be enrolled for ten semesters; after that, the Enrollment Office will require a letter from the doctoral committee and your advisor to continue enrollment.
Continue to meet regularly with your supervisor during this phase and report on your progress. Attend doctoral seminars and events offered by the Doctoral Center. Participation in a course on good scientific practice is mandatory for all doctoral students according to the Doctoral Center Environment and Technology's doctoral regulations.

Initiating the doctoral process

When your dissertation is ready, submit an application to the doctoral committee to initiate the doctoral procedure. For this purpose, you submit your dissertation in printed and digital form. You can propose reviewers for your dissertation - one of the reviewing persons must be a member of the PhD Center and fit to your field of study. The other person(s) will be external. Note that your supervising person may not review the thesis. This follows a recommendation of the German Council of Science and Humanities to ensure the independence of the reviews.

Wait for it

The doctoral committee decides whether to initiate the doctoral procedure. If the procedure is initiated, the committee appoints a doctoral committee for your doctoral procedure and appoints the reviewers of your thesis.

Review

The reviewers then have eight weeks to review your dissertation. Once the reviews have been submitted with a proposal for evaluation, the doctoral committee and the examination board will receive the thesis and the reviews for inspection. In addition, all professors and habilitated members of the Magdeburg-Stendal University of Applied Sciences have two weeks to view the reviews and thesis and, if necessary, to comment on them in writing.
After that, the doctoral committee decides on the acceptance of the dissertation on the basis of the expert opinions and the submitted comments. In exceptional cases, you may need to make additions or changes to your dissertation before it can be accepted; the doctoral committee will then set a deadline for you to do so.

Disputation

No later than three months after acceptance of the dissertation, you will defend it orally before the examination committee. This is open to the public. In addition to other professors, your supervisor(s) and the reviewers sit on the committee. Before the defense (disputation) you will give a presentation of max. 30 minutes; afterwards you will be examined for 60-90 minutes. The content of the disputation is as follows: "The disputation discusses the content of the dissertation, includes the expert opinions and also covers related problems of the subject and adjacent areas of other subjects as well as the state of research in them" (Doctoral Regulations §16, para.7).
Directly after the disputation you will find out your overall grade (composed of the grade of the dissertation (2/3) and the grade of the disputation (1/3)). This is the end of the doctoral procedure.

Publication of the dissertation

Within one year after the disputation you publish your dissertation. If necessary, you will implement the conditions imposed on you by the examination committee after the disputation. The chair of the doctoral committee approves the version ready for publication before publication.

Awarding the doctoral degree

As soon as the dissertation is published, you will receive your doctoral degree certificate. From that point on, you may use your doctoral degree. Congratulations!