AeroAstro Graduate Program doctoral degree
Doctoral Program Objectives
AeroAstro's doctoral program objectives are:
- to produce original research and technologies critical to the engineering of aerospace vehicles, information, and systems
- to educate future leaders in aerospace research and technology
Doctoral Program Student Learning Outcomes
Upon graduation, our doctoral students will have:
- a strong foundation in analytical skills and reasoning
- the ability to solve challenging, engineering problems
- an understanding of the importance and strategic value of their research
- the ability to communicate their research with context and clarity
Doctor of Philosophy (Ph.D.) and Doctor of Science (Sc.D.)
These degrees, for which the requirements are identical, are for students who wish to carry out original research in a focused field, and already hold a master’s degree. AeroAstro offers doctoral degrees in 11 fields. A description of general MIT doctoral requirements appears in the MIT Course Catalogue.
Doctor of Philosophy and Doctor of Science requirements
- English evaluation Test (for non-native English-speakers if not previously satisfied at MIT)
- Technical writing requirement (pdf 20K) if not previously satisfied at MIT
- Field and Research Oral Qualifying Exams, taken within three terms of entering the department. (See below for more information.)
- Formation of a thesis committee and first meeting within 2 regular terms of admission to the doctoral program
- Five graduate-level subjects in the major concentration and three graduate level subjects for the minor concentration, as approved by the student's thesis committee
- Math requirement (pdf 82K)
- Minimum cumulative 4.4 grade point average
- Term-by-term thesis (16THG) registration and progress evaluation
- Thesis proposal and defense within 3 regular terms of admission into the doctoral program (See below for more information.)
- Successful thesis submission and defense within 4 regular terms of passing the thesis proposal defense
See the AeroAstro Doctoral Program Guide (pdf 88K) for additional guidelines
Doctoral Field Exams
Field Exams are one part of the MIT Aero Astro Department doctoral qualifying process. A student seeking entrance to the department's doctoral program must take one of these field exams, which are offered annually in January. Information about the doctoral program and the doctoral qualifying process can be found in the department's Doctoral Program Guide. Field Exam Descriptions (pdf 180K) describes the exam contents.
Following are questions used in past field exams:
Doctoral Research Evaluation
A student seeking entrance to the department's doctoral program must also make a presentation on research they have performed, and then be questioned by a faculty panel, in order to demonstrate their abilities as a researcher. This evaluation takes place along side the Field Exam, as part of the doctoral qualifying process each January. Information about the doctoral program and the doctoral qualifying process can be found in the department's Doctoral Program Guide.
Following are several examples of sucessful research presentations from recent qualifiers, in PowerPoint format:
- Nikolas Pyrgiotis - Approximate Network Delays Model - 2008
- Masayuki Yano - Massively Parallel Domain Decomposition Preconditioner for the High-Order Galerkin Least Squares Finite Element Method - 2009
- David Hall - Performance Limits of Turbomachines - 2010
- Matthew Smith - Minimizing Actuator-Induced Residual Error in Active Space Telescope Primary Mirrors - 2010
Thesis proposal and defense examples
Following are a few examples of successfully written and defended thesis proposals by doctoral candidates within Aero Astro. These may be downloaded and examined as part of your preparation for the Thesis Proposal Defense, a required part of our doctoral program.
- Approximate Dynamic Programming Using Bellman Residual Elimination (Brett Bethke) - Proposal (pdf 412K) - Defense (pdf 4.7M)
- CAD-Based Multifidelity Analysis and Multidisciplinary Optimization in Aircraft Conceptual Design (David Lazzara) - Proposal (pdf 7.6M) - Defense (pdf 11.9M)
- Integrated Modeling for Lightweight, Actuated Mirror Design (Lucy Cohan) - Proposal (pdf 948K) - Defense (pdf 2.7M)
For more information about AeroAstro graduate degree programs, email aeroadmission@mit.edu
