This doctoral programme has a minimum of 36 ECTS for the doctoral courses, to allow the student to start her/his research in full time in the second semester of the 1st year of studies. This timing is necessary when the theses are deeply inter and multidisciplinary and require mastering cleanroom micro and nanofabrication technologies, circuit design, and at the same time the biological, electronic, and/or materials systems. Depending on the thesis project, doctoral students can add an extra 18 ECTS of credits in the 2nd semester of their 1st year of studies.
The proposed programme will match the requirements of already accredited doctoral courses in the degree awarding institutions which in general have an ECTS requirement of 30-42. Nevertheless, and as discussed above, the students and their respective advisors can propose, with the agreement of the directive board, to attend extra coursework in the proponent institutions up to a maximum of 60 ECTS. These extra credits should be oriented to fill the curricular needs of each student as a function of their research project. Most of the team members are actively engaged in postgraduate teaching at their institutions, and these institutions with several UCs which can be attended by the PhD Students in this programme. With such vast offer of post-graduate UCs, each student can easily design their curricular formation under advice of the supervisors and coordination of the programme. A 6 ECTS Teaching Assistantship as preparation for teaching is also available.
This is a new doctoral programme with two degree awarding institution (IST/UL and ITQB/UNL) which matches the requirements of several A3ES-accredited doctoral programmes (Engineering Physics, Biotechnology, Biomedical Engineering, Electrical and Computer Engineering of IST/UL and Molecular Biosciences of ITQB/UNL). It is expected that students who obtain stipends from other sources (FCT, European Projects, and Company Grants) may be registered in these accredited doctoral programmes and choose to participate in the coursework and activities of this doctoral programme, taking full advantage of the proponent teams and course activities and opportunities. An actual number of 10 participants/year is realistically envisaged for this doctoral programme.