Aims of the Research Project Milestone
During the second semester of the first year, Candidates are expected to focus their work and attention on the specific subject that will become their PhD Thesis. They will still follow Doctoral Courses, attend to ABC Research Conferences, other events or activities, in the Department or wherever they can get to the edge of the actual knowledge, following as much as they can their R&T Plan (or negotiating a change with their Supervisors).
Moreover, in the second semester, Candidates are expected to consolidate the choice of their Research Topic, to advance in the understanding of the state of the art about that topic and to choose the field of work to be deepened, to identify a clear Research Question (RQ) and to define how to give an answer to it, writing a Research Project, that will present the Research Methodologies to be adopted and the main steps anmd the resources needed, so that it will be feasible in about two years of work.
It is particular important that the RQ comes in the framework of the State of the Art (SoA). The text of the project is also expected to face the following questions:
- How much is that RQ original? Of course the more original it is, the higher is the probable impact of its answer(s) but, while looking for those who may be facing the same question, be open and consider also non strongly related researches. How many other people are facing similar problems? How many other problems are directly or indirectly related to your RQ? may be in very different fields? Originality is related to the idea of a knowledge gap, of an unexplored space in your field of work. Check if anyone
- How much important (from a social, economical, environmental or just cultural point of view)is the answer that your PhD thesis will give to the world?
In this way, you will face the question of the impact of your research work and that of your future impact, as research.
How to write your PhD Research Project
The basic idea is to start from MILESTONE ONE work, synthetize the State of the Art, change your problem statement in a foreword, enrich and make it evolve in a Research Project and update your bibliography.
For what concerns the lenght of this document, ... it is at your mercy.
In any case:
- don't be too short: a synthetic version of it is expected to be part of your EoY Report, so this must be longer!
- Don't be too long and think about attachments, in particular, don't copy and paste other (your) work inside it, also if you already have publications and some draft chapter of your future thesis, make the life of your readers lighter.