1. Purpose and Scope
• The Doctoral Qualifying Examination, administered to assess the scientific competence, core disciplinary knowledge, analytical thinking skills, and readiness for doctoral-level research of students enrolled in a doctoral program, shall be conducted in accordance with these Guidelines.
• These Guidelines cover the qualifying examination procedures for students registered in PHYS699 or CHEM699 in the doctoral programs of the EMU Departments of Physics and Chemistry.
• These Guidelines shall be implemented in consideration of the Eastern Mediterranean University Graduate Studies and Examinations Regulations, the Council of Higher Education (YÖK) framework for graduate education, and the principles of academic equivalency.
2. General Structure of the Examination
• The Doctoral Qualifying Examination shall be administered by the Department as a single qualifying examination consisting of two components: a written examination and an oral examination.
• The written examination shall cover a total of five subject areas: four core course areas and one field elective selected by the student in consultation with the supervisor and approved by the relevant graduate committee.
• The oral examination shall assess the student's conceptual command, analytical thinking ability, breadth of knowledge, capacity for scientific expression, and readiness for doctoral-level research.
• The examination shall be held on dates announced by the Department Chair within the examination period announced by the Institute of Graduate Studies and Research.
3. Doctoral Qualifying Examination Committee
• The Doctoral Qualifying Examination Committee shall consist of five faculty members nominated by the Department Chair and approved by the Institute Directorate.
• The Committee shall be responsible for the academic and administrative coordination of the qualifying examination process. It shall prepare jury nominations, oversee the assessment procedures, and submit the examination results to the Department Chair.
• Committee members shall be selected from among full-time faculty members serving in the Departments of Physics and Chemistry and Distinguished Professors as defined under the relevant regulations. Where necessary, the academic needs of the program and areas of expertise shall be taken into account.
• The Chair of the Graduate Studies Committee shall serve as Chair of the Doctoral Qualifying Examination Committee. Where that person is the supervisor of the student concerned, the Vice Chair of the Department shall chair the Committee for that student's qualifying examination process.
4. Doctoral Qualifying Examination Jury
• The Doctoral Qualifying Examination Jury shall make the final academic assessment of the student's examination performance and determine a Pass/Fail decision.
• The Doctoral Qualifying Examination Jury shall be proposed by the Doctoral Qualifying Examination Committee, after consultation with the student's supervisor, and submitted for Institute approval through the Department Chair.
• The Jury shall consist of five faculty members, including the supervisor. The supervisor shall participate in the assessment process as a jury member and shall have voting rights; however, the supervisor may not chair the examination jury.
• In accordance with YÖK requirements and the principles of academic equivalency, two jury members shall be selected from faculty members employed at higher education institutions outside EMU whose areas of expertise are directly related to the student's examination and/or thesis field.
• Jury members shall be selected from among full-time faculty members and Distinguished Professors, as defined under the relevant regulations, whose academic expertise is related to the student's examination areas and intended doctoral research field.
• All five jury members shall actively participate in the assessment process. During the oral examination, each jury member is expected to ask questions for the purpose of evaluating the student.
• External jury members may contribute electronically to the preparation and assessment of written examination questions or provide academic opinions.
5. Written Examination
• The written examination shall assess the student's level of knowledge in the four core course areas and one field elective.
• The written examination may be held in one or more sessions within the officially announced qualifying examination period; however, all sessions shall be regarded as components of a single Doctoral Qualifying Examination.
• Each subject area shall be assessed out of 100 points.
• The written examination grade shall be calculated as the arithmetic mean of the grades obtained in the five subject areas.
• Written examination questions shall be prepared in accordance with the subject coverage specified in these Guidelines and in the approved course descriptions of the relevant courses.
• Unless otherwise determined by the Jury on academic grounds, the duration of each written subject-area session shall not exceed three hours.
A candidate whose written examination average is below 70/100 shall not be admitted to the oral examination and shall be deemed unsuccessful.
6. Oral Examination
• As a rule, the oral examination shall be held within the week following the written examination.
• Unless otherwise determined by the Jury for valid academic reasons, the oral examination shall not exceed one hour.
• Questions may be asked from the approved field elective, the core subject areas, and the proposed doctoral research field.
• The oral examination may also be conducted on the basis of a short presentation, literature review, research note, or similar academic material assigned in advance by the Jury.
• Within the framework of the relevant regulations, the oral examination may be open to faculty members, graduate students, and subject specialists. However, the assessment and decision-making stage shall be conducted in a closed session attended only by the jury members.
• The oral examination shall be assessed by each jury member out of 100 points. The oral examination grade shall be calculated as the arithmetic mean of the grades awarded by the jury members.
7. Assessment and Examination Results
• The written examination grade and oral examination performance shall be evaluated together by the Jury.
• As an internal departmental assessment criterion, the final weighted grade shall be calculated by assigning a weight of 80% to the written examination grade and 20% to the oral examination grade.
For a candidate to be considered successful, the final weighted grade must be at least 70/100 and the candidate must also be found successful by a simple majority of the Jury. If either of these conditions is not satisfied, the candidate shall be deemed unsuccessful.
• The Jury shall determine the result of the student's Doctoral Qualifying Examination by simple majority as Pass (QS) or Fail (QU).
• The Jury's final decision shall be recorded in written minutes and communicated by the Department Chair to the Institute of Graduate Studies and Research within the prescribed period.
• Within the framework of the relevant regulations, the Jury may require a student who has successfully completed the qualifying examination to take one or more additional courses, provided that the total credit load is not exceeded.
8. Repeat Examination, Non-Attendance, and Excuses
• A candidate who fails the Doctoral Qualifying Examination shall retake the examination in the following examination period, subject to University regulations.
• The relevant EMU graduate regulations shall apply to a student who fails the Doctoral Qualifying Examination for a second time.
• A candidate who does not attend the examination without a valid excuse accepted by the competent authorities shall be deemed unsuccessful.
• Where a justified excuse or extraordinary circumstances exist, postponement of the examination may be permitted in accordance with University procedures and subject to the necessary approvals.
9. Administrative Provisions
• Students who have completed their seminar and course requirements shall take the qualifying examination by registering for PHYS699 or CHEM699 during the registration period of the relevant semester.
• The examination schedule, venue, session arrangements, and implementation details shall be announced by the Department Chair.
• All written examinations shall begin and end within the University's official working hours.
• Written examination invigilators shall be selected from among full-time academic staff holding a doctoral degree. The supervisor or co-supervisor shall not be appointed as an invigilator.
• Written examination papers, grading records, oral examination assessment records, and final reports shall be archived in the student's official departmental and/or institutional file.
• These Guidelines, together with the approved course coverage, shall be made accessible to students when they register for PHYS699 or CHEM699.
• For matters not covered by these Guidelines, the Eastern Mediterranean University Graduate Studies and Examinations Regulations, the relevant decisions of the Institute, and the higher education legislation in force shall apply.
10. Core Course Areas and Approved Field Elective
• Detailed core course areas for the Physics Doctoral Program are provided in Appendix A.
• Detailed core course areas for the Chemistry Doctoral Program are provided in Appendix B.
• The fifth subject area shall be a field elective selected by the student in consultation with the supervisor and approved by the graduate committee of the relevant department.
• For both the Chemistry and Physics programs, the field elective shall, as a rule, be selected from the graduate-level subject area most closely related to the student's intended doctoral research field.
• In the Chemistry program, the fourth core course area shall be either Polymer Chemistry or Electrochemistry, depending on the student's research orientation; the fifth subject area shall be a separate field elective.
Appendix A. Core Course Areas of the Physics Doctoral Program
The four core course areas of the Physics Doctoral Qualifying Examination are Classical Mechanics, Electrodynamics, Quantum Mechanics, and Mathematical Methods.
| Core Course Area | Approved Subject Coverage |
| Classical Mechanics | Fundamental principles; variational principles; the central-force problem; rigid-body motion; oscillations; Lagrangian formulation; Hamiltonian formulation; canonical transformations; and Hamilton-Jacobi theory. |
| Electrodynamics | Electrostatics; boundary-value techniques, including the method of images and separation of variables; magnetostatics; Faraday's law; Maxwell's equations; gauge choices; retarded solutions; and Poynting's theorem.
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| Quantum Mechanics | Quantum kinematics and dynamics; simple one-dimensional problems; continuous and discrete symmetries; angular momentum; spherical symmetry; a charged particle in a magnetic field; identical particles; perturbation theory; approximation methods; variational methods; and scattering theory. |
| Mathematical Methods | Vector analysis; curvilinear coordinates and tensors; complex variables; residues; the gamma function; differential equations; and the calculus of variations. |
Detailed topic lists and reference textbooks shall be determined in accordance with the approved course descriptions of the courses offered by the Department.
Appendix B. Core Course Areas of the Chemistry Doctoral Program
The four core course areas of the Chemistry Doctoral Qualifying Examination are Analytical Chemistry, Organic Chemistry, Physical Chemistry, and, depending on the student's research field, either Polymer Chemistry (Physical Chemistry Area) or Electrochemistry (Organic Chemistry Area).
| Core Course Area | Approved Subject Coverage |
| Analytical Chemistry | The nature of analytical chemistry; calculations used in analytical chemistry; error analysis and statistical evaluation of data; sampling, standardization, and calibration; aqueous equilibrium systems; gravimetric methods; titrations; introduction to electrochemistry; spectroscopy; solvent extraction; and chromatography. |
| Organic Chemistry | IUPAC nomenclature; stereochemistry and chirality; nucleophilic substitution; addition and elimination reactions; radical reactions; and electrophilic aromatic substitution reactions. |
| Physical Chemistry | Thermodynamics: a brief review of fundamental terms and concepts; thermodynamic properties; material balance; chemical potentials and material equilibrium; phase and reaction equilibria; phase transitions and phase diagrams; metastable states; and miscibility gaps. Statistical thermodynamics. Rate equations, reaction rates, and molar rates. Electrochemical systems: thermodynamics of electrochemical systems; galvanic cells; electrodes; electrode potentials; and polarity. Kinetic theory of gases: pressure, temperature, distributions, collisions and effusion, and heat capacities. Transport processes: thermal and electrical conductivity, viscosity, and diffusion. Reaction kinetics: measurement and determination of reaction rates; reaction mechanisms; complex reactions; unimolecular, trimolecular, and chain reactions; fast reactions; reactions in liquid solutions; and catalysis. |
| Polymer Chemistry | Polymer Structure: chain length, average chain dimensions, chain flexibility, stereochemistry, molecular interactions, branching, cross-linking, tacticity, average molecular weights, copolymers, amorphous and semicrystalline states, glass transition and melting transition, and average molecular weights. Polymer Synthesis: chain-growth polymerization; free-radical polymerization, anionic polymerization, cationic polymerization, chain copolymerization, coordination polymerization, and step-growth polymerization. Polymer Characterization: polymer solutions and solubility, thermodynamics of polymer solutions, methods of molecular-weight determination (membrane osmometry, cryoscopy, ebullioscopy, dilute-solution viscometry, and light scattering), spectroscopic techniques, thermal analysis, mechanical properties, elastomers, fibers, thermoplastics, and thermosets.
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| Electrochemistry | Electrochemical experiments; cyclic and linear sweep voltammetry; step and pulse techniques; solid-state electrochemistry; conducting polymers; photoelectrochemistry; bioelectrochemistry; and electrochemistry in industry. |
Detailed topic lists and reference textbooks shall be determined in accordance with the approved course descriptions of the courses offered by the Department.
