Mechanical Engineering Major, PhD

Requirements

All students must complete a minimum of 72 graduate semester credit hours beyond the bachelor’s degree. These must include a minimum of 24 credit hours in Doctoral Research and Dissertation. Specific requirements for required course work are:

• Students entering with an MS degree will be required to take a minimum of 12 credit hours of graduate course work, exclusive of ME 601 , dissertation credit or seminar courses.
• Students entering with a BS degree will be required to take a minimum of 42 credit hours of graduate course work, exclusive of ME 601 , dissertation credit or seminar courses.

This course work, including that taken for an MS degree, must include:

• A minimum of 9 semester credit hours of graduate work in mathematics courses numbered 400 or above with a minimum of 3 credit hours numbered 500 or above. The department may approve other courses with sufficient mathematical content to meet this requirement.
• A minimum of 21 credit hours of graduate course work in the major in courses numbered 500 and above. The department may approve other departmental courses to meet this requirement.
• A minimum of 6 semester credit hours of graduate course work is required at the 600 level. These are exclusive of ME 601 , thesis or dissertation credit. The total number of approved course work and dissertation credit hours must meet the university’s requirement of a minimum of 72 credit hours.

Additional requirements for all students include the following.

• Registration and participation in the graduate seminar in the major program.
• Meet all departmental examination requirements, which include passing a written and oral comprehensive examination.
• Presentation of a dissertation proposal to the student’s advisory committee and approval of that proposal by that committee.
• Successful defense of the dissertation.