Nuclear Engineering and Radiological Sciences

This document describes the requirements of the department of Nuclear Engineering and Radiological Sciences for Masters and Doctoral degrees. Besides the requirements outlined here, students should review the requirements of the Rackham Graduate School, available online at http://www.rackham.umich.edu/StudentInfo/Publications/.

1. M.S. Graduation Requirements

The Master's degree in Nuclear Engineering and Radiological Sciences requires 30 hours of coursework at the graduate level, including 20 hours from NERS (of which four courses must be at the 500 level or above). Rackham requires a minimum of four credit hours of cognate graduate-level coursework. NERS requires that the cognate courses be related to the student's degree program and should be chosen with the advice of the student's graduate advisor. A student must also take at least one 400 level or higher laboratory course for the M.S. degree. The average grade in NERS courses must be a B (a grade point of 5.0/9.0) or better, and the average grade for all courses must also be a B or higher. Please review the "Checklist for M.S. Degree Requirements" available in the departmental office.

For additional requirements of the Rackham School of Graduate Studies, please refer to the Rackham Student Handbook available at their website http://www.rackham.umich.edu/StudentInfo/Publications/.

2. Ph.D. Candidacy and Graduation Requirements

All Ph.D. students start as precandidates. Once certain coursework and exam requirements have been met they can advance to candidacy. Advancement to candidacy is an important step and should not be delayed. Precandidates are expected to do research, but once candidacy is achieved, research becomes the major focus of the candidate's work. All students must find a research advisor to supervise their research.

Laboratory Course Requirement:

All Ph.D. students must take NERS 515, Nuclear Measurements Laboratory, and obtain a grade of B (5.00) or better. Students who have taken NERS 315 as an undergraduate must instead take one of NERS 425, NERS 575 or NERS 586. The graduate program chair must approve in writing any variances and substitutions.

Breadth Course Requirements:

All Ph.D. students must take and obtain a grade of B (5.00) or better in 6 credit hours of NERS courses selected from outside the student's option, as defined by the following lists of courses. Courses not listed do not satisfy this requirement; the graduate chair must approve any variances in writing. The purpose of this requirement is to ensure the breadth of nuclear engineering and radiological science education of our Ph.D. students and to ensure that the student is exposed to the quantitative analytical methods used in other specialties in the field. A laboratory course used to satisfy this breadth requirement cannot be used to satisfy the laboratory requirement (above).

Rackham Requirements:

A student must complete 36 credit hours to achieve candidacy, of which 18 may transfer from a M.S. degree. Generally, only 9 credit hours are countedper term. A total of 68 credit hours are required for the Ph.D. degree. For a complete and detailed description of Rackham Candidacy requirements, see the Rackham Student Handbook available on the web at http://www.rackham.umich.edu/StudentInfo/Publications/.

Written Candidacy Exam:

The candidacy examination is a six-hour test in a specific option: 1) Fission Systems and Radiation Transport; 2) Plasmas and Fusion; 3) Materials; 4) Measurements; 5) Radiation, Environment and Medical; or 6) an alternative area approved in advance by the Executive Committee. The exam covers topics at the graduate level. Students should consult the description of each option and their research advisor for an enumeration of topics covered and relevant courses. The exam is prepared by the examination committee in each option and is given twice a year, in January and in May.

A student must be a precandidate to take the written candidacy exam. The student must take the written examination within 25 months after admission to the graduate program. Exceptions will only be considered by petition to the Departmental Executive Committee. The exam is graded anonymously. The full faculty of the department makes decisions on pass/fail for this exam. A student may attempt this exam multiple times, but attempts beyond the second require approval of the department faculty. Note that it is not uncommon for students to attempt the exam more than once.

Note on Advancement to Candidacy: After the student has passed the written candidacy exam, the department will audit the student's record to check that all candidacy requirements have been met. The student's research advisor and the NERS Graduate Chair will then approve advancement to candidacy.

Dissertation Prospectus:

An oral thesis prospectus exam is required for completion of the PhD degree. This exam must be taken within 12 months of achieving candidacy status, and after the candidate has formed a dissertation committee.

The exam will consist of a presentation by the candidate on his or her proposed research program, lasting about 30 minutes, followed by questioning. After questions covering the presentation material, questions of a more fundamental but related nature may be introduced. These questions may cover material found in standard undergraduate or introductory graduate NERS courses. This question period is nominally expected to last 60 minutes.

This examining committee will consist of at least 3 members of the student's dissertation committee (the full committee will be invited), and one randomly selected NERS faculty member from outside the candidate's dissertation committee. The chair of the examining committee will be the student's dissertation committee chair. Following the questioning the examining committee will discuss the proposed research and prospectus, and vote on passing or failing the student; their decision will be communicated to the student as soon afterwards as practicable, generally along with suggestions for the direction of the research, and to the NERS faculty as a whole at the next faculty meeting.

This exam may be attempted twice; the second attempt must occur within 12 months of the first. Additional attempts beyond the second will require approval of the NERS faculty.

The oral examination will be scheduled at the student's request with the approval of his/her advisor. The student should then submit his or her name, option, research topic and an abstract to the departmental Graduate Coordinator, along with some dates that both the advisor and student find convenient. The Graduate Coordinator will then set the committee, schedule the exam, and reserve the room for the exam.

Dissertation and Dissertation Defense:

Ph.D. students must complete a written dissertation describing an original, substantive, and scholarly contribution to their field of study. A dissertation committee, chaired by the student's research advisor, will read this dissertation and its abstract and judge their adequacy. The committee may require changes to the dissertation. Each student must also present and successfully defend her dissertation work at a public meeting.