Number of PhD students

PhD education is research training and advanced studies following a Master’s degree. Aalborg University offers PhD education within four different fields under four faculties.

A PhD programme comprises three years of full-time study and must be based on a Master’s degree. Within the tree years, sufficient time must be set aside for individual research work and preparation of the thesis. Furthermore, students must gain experience with teaching activities or other types of knowledge dissemination.

When the thesis has been submitted, an assessment committee will be appointed, and they will give their recommendation after the public defence. The PhD degree is awarded to scholars who have satisfactorily completed their research training and submitted a thesis.

The tables below illustrate the total number of PhD students and the total PhD student intake for each faculty. The numbers are calculated each year on 31 December.

PhD students	2019	2020	2021	2022	2023
Humanities and Social Sciences	156	126	123	113	114
Medicine	216	215	210	209	226
TECH	194	197	195	215	215
Engineering	272	283	292	289	294
Total	838	821	820	826	849

 

 

PhD student intake

The table below shows the number of PhD students intake at each faculty. The number is calculated on the basis of the entire calendar year.

PhD intake	2019	2020	2021	2022	2023
Humanities and Social Sciences	24	24	33	33	27
Medicine	54	53	69	53	74
TECH	60	62	61	71	59
Engineering	74	92	96	87	80
Total	212	231	259	244	240

 

 

PhD degrees

The table below shows the number of PhD degrees awarded at each faculty. The number is calculated on the basis of the entire calendar year.

PhD degrees	2019	2020	2021	2022	2023
Humanities and Social Sciences	28	45	27	30	19
Medicine	33	53	56	50	49
TECH	35	30	42	44	56
Engineering	62	72	70	57	49
Total	158	200	195	181	187

 

Research publications 

The number of research publications is a key figure representing the production of the University. You may study the University’s many publications at the AAU research portal.

Research publications	2018	2019	2020	2021	2022
Humanities and Social Sciences	1,827	1,515	1,498	1,334	1,117
Medicine	1,299	1,353	1,501	1,643	1,764
Engineering	1,982	2,079	2,171	2,056	1,611
TECH	1,185	1,083	1,182	1,208	1,124
Total	6,293	6,030	6,352	6,241	5,616

 

Activities

Aalborg University’s knowledge exchange and cooperation with the surrounding world may be found in the national statistics on the commercialisation of research results published by the The Danish Agency for Science, Technology and Innovation since 2005.

Each year, researchers at Aalborg University generate world class inventions and research results with great commercial potential on the basis of research undertaken at the University and research collaborations with companies and other research institutions.

The focus of the Technology Transfer Office is the transfer of new technologies to the business community according to the Act on inventions at public research institutions, applying to inventions made after 2000.

Each year, the Technology Transfer Office receives a number of reports on new inventions, and a large part of these turn into commercial technology transfers.

Activities	2016	2017	2018	2019	2020	2021	2022
Reported inventions	68	71	81	57	66	58	41
Sold and licensed inventions	41	42	31	54	39	34	-
Spin-out companies	1	1	2	5	4	2	-
Patent applications	14	16	11	8	7	6	12