Governance

The PhD Program in Plant Sciences is approved as a structured PhD program by leading universities: the ETH Zurich (ETHZ), the University of Zurich (UZH) and the University of Basel (UNIBAS) and is part of Life Science Zurich Graduate School (LSZGS).

It is lead by one representative of PSC principal investigators (PI, director: Prof Ueli Grossniklaus, UZH), PSC head of studies (Dr. Melanie Paschke, PSC) and the PSC PhD program coordinator (Dr. Bojan Gujas, PSC) that is your contact point for questions.

Two times per year, there is a board meeting of PhD programs at LSZGS. Each PhD Program has an opportunity to elect one representative of students, giving the doctoral students a voice for decisions. The doctoral representatives from all LSZGS PhD programs elect four representatives who have voting rights during the board meetings of the LSZGS. The election will be reconfirmed every year. 

If you wish to be your program student reporesentative countact us. 

Enrolment at a host university and participation in the PhD Program in Plant Sciences are two distinct, yet closely interconnected, procedures. Each host university—and in some cases individual departments—defines its own doctoral regulations and expectations for PhD candidates, including requirements related to ECTS credits, doctorate progress monitoring, and other formal responsibilities throughout the doctoral studies.

The PhD Program in Plant Sciences has been designed to align with these existing university frameworks and to remain sufficiently flexible so as not to impose additional administrative or academic burden on doctoral candidates. At the same time, it provides a structured, quality-assured training that complements the thesis research at the home institution, supports the development of advanced research and transferable skills, and documents these competencies in a transparent manner.

Upon successful completion, participation in the PhD Program leads to a Diploma Supplement issued by the PhD Program in Plant Sciences, which formally records the acquired skills and enhances their visibility for future academic and non-academic career paths.

At the UZH, doctoral studies are governed by university-level and faculty-level regulations. The central legal framework for doctoral education within the Faculty of Science (MNF) is defined by the Ordinance for Obtaining a Doctoral Degree at the Faculty of Science of the University of Zurich (LINK) . This ordinance establishes the general requirements applicable to all doctoral candidates at UZH and within the MNF, including provisions related to admission, supervision, doctoral agreements, progress monitoring, and degree completion.
Within this regulatory framework, structured doctoral training is further supported through the LSZGS, which provides an overarching organizational structure for PhD programs in the life sciences at UZH and ETHZ. LSZGS does not define independent doctoral regulations but operates in full alignment with UZH and faculty ordinances, offering coordinated training, mentoring structures, and quality assurance mechanisms through its affiliated PhD programs.
In addition to the general university and faculty regulations, LSZGS and its individual PhD programs define complementary program-specific regulations that relate exclusively to the structure and documentation of doctoral training activities. These additional regulations specify, in particular, expectations regarding coursework, ECTS credit allocation within the PhD Program, and the organization of structured training elements. They do not affect the formal requirements for obtaining the doctoral degree and are designed to remain fully compatible with the overarching UZH and MNF governance.

Plant Sciences at UZH
Doctoral candidates participating in the PhD Program in Plant Sciences are enrolled at the Faculty of Science and conduct their PhD research in a range of departments reflecting the breadth of plant sciences at UZH. These include, in particular, the Department of Plant and Microbial Biology, the Department of Geography, the Department of Evolutionary Biology and Environmental Studies, and the Department of Systematic and Evolutionary Botany. Regardless of departmental affiliation, the academic responsibility for supervision, evaluation, and awarding of the doctoral degree remains with the host faculty and the supervising professor(s).

The PhD Program in Plant Sciences is designed to operate downstream of the university and faculty regulations. Its program-specific training regulations provide a transparent framework for coursework and skills development, while ensuring complete compatibility with existing governance structures and avoiding any additional administrative or academic burden for doctoral candidates.

Doctoral studies at ETHZ are governed by the Ordinance on the Doctorate at at the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology Zurich (ETHZ)  from 23 November 2021 (RSETHZ 340.3 ), which defines the legal requirements, procedures, and institutional responsibilities for the awarding of doctoral degrees. The Ordinance regulates admission (provisional and definitive), supervision, doctoral studies (regular and extended), the aptitude colloquium, the doctoral examination, and the conferral of the doctoral title.
In accordance with Art. 52 of the Ordinance, each department issues its own Detailed Stipulations regarding the Doctorate, which define department-specific procedures within this framework.

Unlike some universities, ETHZ does not organise doctorates within a compulsory overarching doctoral study programme. Doctoral candidates assemble the components of their doctoral studies individually in accordance with the Ordinance and the applicable departmental detailed stipulations. Departments may, however, organise their doctoral studies in the form of structured doctoral programmes. One example is the LSZGS, which jointly offers doctoral programmes at ETHZ and the UZH. Participation in such doctoral programmes is optional for doctoral candidates at ETHZ and does not replace or modify the formal requirements defined in the ETHZ Ordinance on the Doctorate.

The PhD Program in Plant Sciences operates as one of the structured programmes within the LSZGS and functions as a complementary training framework. It does not assume any supervisory, evaluative, or decision-making authority regarding the doctoral thesis, doctoral examination, or degree conferral.

For doctoral candidates affiliated with ETHZ and with the PhD Program in Plant Sciences, the applicable regulatory framework consists of:

1. the ETHZ Ordinance on the Doctorate,
2. the detailed stipulations of the respective department
3. and the program-specific regulations of the PhD Program in Plant Sciences, which govern only the structure, documentation, and quality assurance of structured training activities.
    

At UNIBAS, doctoral studies are governed by university-level and faculty-level regulations. The central legal framework for doctoral education within the Faculty of Science is defined by the Promotionsordnung der Philosophisch-Naturwissenschaftlichen Fakultät der Universität Basel . This ordinance establishes the general requirements applicable to all doctoral candidates within the UNIBAS Faculty of Science, including provisions related to admission, supervision, doctoral agreements, progress monitoring, and degree completion.

PSC PhD Programs are not officially recognized by other faculties of the UNIBAS. Nevertheless, it is possible for PhD candidates from other faculties to participate in the PSC PhD Programs.

The PhD Program in Plant Sciences is designed to operate downstream of the university and faculty regulations. Its program-specific training regulations provide a transparent framework for coursework and skills development, while ensuring complete compatibility with existing governance structures and avoiding any additional administrative or academic burden for doctoral candidates.

Participation in the PhD Program in Plant Sciences does not replace or override the doctoral governance of the home institution. Rather, it complements the institutional doctoral framework by providing an interdisciplinary, cross-university training environment.