This has never happened before in Germany's higher education landscape: the Technische Hochschule Mittelhessen is the first university of applied sciences (HAW) to open an independent Graduate Centre for Engineering Sciences . Until now, the “ Dr.-Ing. “ only possible at universities. Hesse is the only federal state that grants the universities of applied sciences - the former universities of applied sciences - the right to award doctorates in areas with strong research interests.
Science Minister Angela Dorn: "Researching nature and developing technical processes and products from it is becoming more important than ever: we need ideas for new, sustainable materials or further medical-technical developments. With the new doctoral center of the Technische Hochschule Mittelhessen we are playing a pioneering role nationwide. Together we are strengthening the universities of applied sciences in tackling application-related research projects.”
The entire Research Campus of Central Hessen also benefits from the new doctoral center. The FCMH is a joint institution of the Justus Liebig University Gießen , Philipps University of Marburg and the Technical University of Central Hesse and combines the strengths of the three universities in Central Hesse in order to achieve more together in research, promoting young talent and in knowledge and technology transfer. Central Hesse is intended to become even more attractive and internationally visible as a research and education region. At the same time, synergies are created between the universities by establishing future-oriented cooperation structures.
The new doctoral center specializes in life science engineering, combining the fundamentals of natural sciences with technical applications. This results in research that is relevant to human health or environmental protection.
THM President Prof. Dr. Matthias Willems: “Excellent researchers from different disciplines work together in the doctoral center. We have specifically established and expanded the focus on life science engineering. The link between the life sciences and engineering opens up the possibility of developing novel products and processes for the pharmaceutical and chemical industries, medical physics or environmental technology. We use this to research future markets. And with the expertise in the doctoral center, the attractiveness of the THM increases for students, doctoral candidates, scientists and also for our cooperation partners in business.”
So far, five doctoral centers in Hesse have been able to start their work: social sciences (Fulda University of Applied Sciences), public health (Fulda University of Applied Sciences), social work (joint center of the Frankfurt University of Applied Sciences, Fulda University of Applied Sciences, RheinMain University of Applied Sciences and in the future also Darmstadt University of Applied Sciences), Applied computer science (joint center of the Darmstadt University of Applied Sciences, the Frankfurt University of Applied Sciences, the Fulda University of Applied Sciences and the RheinMain University of Applied Sciences) and sustainability sciences (Darmstadt University of Applied Sciences). Only disciplines in which the universities, alone or together, have demonstrated a certain research strength are eligible for doctoral projects. In concrete terms, this means that every professor who, as a member of a doctoral center in a technical discipline, wants to have primary responsibility for supervising or reviewing a doctorate, must have raised at least 300,000 euros in third-party funding and published six publications within three years. For non-technical subjects, such as the social sciences, the limits are 150,000 euros and three publications reviewed by experts in three years. Another requirement is a certain minimum number of "research-strong" scientists in a discipline in order to offer doctoral candidates a suitable scientific environment. As a lower limit, the number of twelve research-oriented professors in a subject area is set in the approval guidelines.
"When the first doctoral center was opened at the Fulda University of Applied Sciences in October 2016, it attracted attention far beyond the borders of Hesse. Young scientists are now working on their doctoral theses in application-oriented research projects in a total of six centres. In this way, we not only strengthen the career prospects of young scientists, but in many cases also the research competence of small and medium-sized companies in the region. The possibility of being able to award a doctorate independently makes the Hessian HAWs even more attractive for young scientists,” emphasized Science Minister Angela Dorn.