Doctoral theses: towards digitalization

The authors are being asked the permission to digitalize and publish their theses.
The authors are being asked the permission to digitalize and publish their theses.
Institutional
(19/09/2018)

Doctoral theses at the University of Barcelona are kept as part of the PhD studentʼs academic records and are treated as protected works under the authorʼs rights rule. At the moment, the storage and access to theses at the UB depends on whether they were read before or after the 2011 regulations.

The authors are being asked the permission to digitalize and publish their theses.
The authors are being asked the permission to digitalize and publish their theses.
Institutional
19/09/2018

Doctoral theses at the University of Barcelona are kept as part of the PhD studentʼs academic records and are treated as protected works under the authorʼs rights rule. At the moment, the storage and access to theses at the UB depends on whether they were read before or after the 2011 regulations.

Since 2011, with the Royal Decree 99/2011 which states that official doctoral studies, theses under this regulation are included in the TDX document repository. These works are digitally signed and protected by the authorʼs right regulation, and can be easily looked up online. In case the theses could lead to patents, the rule states that a period of time for an embargo (without having the thesis published online) can be required, albeit for a limited period of time. 

Regarding those theses that were presented prior to this rule, a part of these are also published in TDX Tesis Doctorals en Xarza (online doctoral theses), if the author authorizes so. The UB has a written copy of those theses that are not published, these are find in the CRAI libraries and in order to read them, an authorʼs authorization is required.

The UB policy guarantees the promotion of the publication of the thesis, not only to read them and keep the originality of this work but also to contribute to the diffusion of scientific knowledge and keep authorʼs rights regarding the theses. Online theses can be found in TDX (which counts on the participation of sixteen universities), and are also available to be shared on international portals such as DART-Europe E-theses and OpenAIRE.

38 million downloads

The TDX repository has 31.212 theses available, from which 509 are under temporary embargoes. Regarding the UB theses, there have been 38 million downloads (205 million among all universities), which can give us a glimpse of the number of people looking them up. There are old theses, from 1873, starting with the oral examination by Laurio Clariana, engineer and mechanic. The first complete thesis is by Dolors Aleu (1882), the first graduate woman in Medicine, with a thesis titled De la necesidad de encaminar por nueva senda la educación higiénico-moral de la mujer.

The UB is working on the transition from paper to online publications. From October 2 on, the new model of online administration will be available and it involves the digitalization of academic records as well as doctoral theses. This means that in the future, the only valid document will be the one online. The UB is working on the digitalization of paper theses in order to provide its open access and to make room in CRAI libraries. For this reason, the authors are being asked the permission to digitalize and publish their theses. Regarding those theses in paper, which can be read with the authorʼs authorization.