Project and Dissertation

To complete your MEE course it is required two semesters:

Note that both curricular units (PIC2 and DMEE) are available in any semester, but students must get approval on PIC2 before enrolling in DMEE. However, before enrolment in PIC2, the students must first select the topic of the dissertation from the topics proposed by professors.

Dissertation Topic

The process of selection of the dissertation topic starts with the professors proposing a list of possible topics. This process starts in the semester before the student enrols in PIC2. Since the students can enrol in PIC2 in any semester, the schedule differs accordingly:

PIC2 in the 1st semester (DMEE in the 2nd semester of the same academic year)

 Professors propose a list of dissertation topics

 during April

 Topics are published for students to analyse and apply

 from May 15th

 Students select and register their choices (ordered)

 until June 15th

 Professors assign topics to students

 until June 30th


PIC2 in the 2nd semester (DMEE in the 1st semester of the next academic year)

 Professors propose a list of dissertation topics

 during October

 Topics are published for students to analyse and apply

 from November 15th

 Students select and register their choices (ordered)

 until December 15th

 Professors assign topics to students

 until January 15th


Documents to be Submitted

PIC2

For the PIC2 curricular course, students must submit one PDF file containing the PIC2 report.

This document must follow all the rules of the final DMEE document. However, this document is a preliminary study on the dissertation topic. It should include all research and work that was done so far. However, the document should have, typically 20-25 pages (it can not exceed 30 pages including appendixes). It should include:
  • Abstract;
  • Introduction, with motivation and problem definition;
  • State of the art (related works);
  • Objectives and methodology of the work that will be performed during the dissertation;
  • Expected results and existing preliminary results (simulations and/or measurement results, etc);
  • Proposed Schedule;
  • Conclusions;
  • References;
  • Appendixes (if necessary).
Note that, PIC2 is a 6 ECTS curricular unit that precedes the thesis. Therefore, it is recommended and valued that the presented work include already some simulations and/or experimental results.

DMEE

For the DMEE, students must submit:
  • The dissertation report (core up to 80 pages and total size with the annexes cannot exceed 100 pages).
  • One extended abstract in the form of a scientific paper (up to 10 pages) written in English.

Submission Schedule

Project - PIC2

PIC2 in the 1st semester

  Submission of Documents
 until the beginning of normal exams of the 1st semester (2nd quarter)
  Public Evaluation  until the end of appeal exams of the 1st semester (2nd quarter)


PIC2 in the 2nd semester

  Submission of Documents
 until the beginning of normal exams of the 2nd semester (4th quarter)
  Public Evaluation  until the end of appeal exams of the 2nd semester (4th quarter)


Dissertation - DMEE

DMEE in the 1st semester

  Submission of Documents   until May 31st
  Public Evaluation
  during the first 3 weeks of June
  Submission of Final Documents
  July 10th


DMEE in the 2nd semester

  Submission of Documents   until October 31st
  Public Evaluation
  during the first 3 weeks of November
  Submission of Final Documents
  December 10th


Document Submission Process

All submissions must be done using the Fénix academic system. No paper delivery will be accepted.
Students can find the upload location in Fénix in the Student tab, choosing Submit/Projects, then the semester in which they are enrolled in the corresponding curricular unit, and the either "Project Submission" (for PIC2) or "Dissertation Submission" (for DMEE), and finally Submit File.

Be aware of the deadline, because Fénix will close the submission system at 23:59 on the day of the deadline. Students can (and should) test the submission process before the deadline because the system is configured to keep only the latest submitted file. Once the process is completed, students should send an email to the MEE Coordinator indicating that they have completed the process.


The delivery of the PIC2 report, as well as the jury proposal, must be uploaded by the student electronically via Fénix in a single file (ZIP or RAR) containing two PDF files (the jury proposal and work report) until the deadline for PIC2 documents submission.
The jury proposal is an adviser's responsibility, even if it is delivered by the students (students must get this document in advance from their advisers).

IMPORTANT: the name of the ZIP file must unequivocally identify the student, being the following format mandatory: <StudentNumber-Name-Surname>.zip (example: 654321-Mario-Gocalves.zip).

The general regulation and the relevant PIC2 forms are available in the "Related Documents" section at the end of this page.


For the DMEE submission, students must upload a single file (ZIP or RAR) containing the two PDF files (the extended abstract and the dissertation report).

The general regulations and the relevant DMEE forms are available in the "Related Documents" section at the end of this page.

Document Rules

IST formal rules for the dissertation document (also applied to the PIC2 report) are published by the Graduate Area (AG). Unfortunately, these documents are only available in Portuguese. The latest version is available here.
Special attention must be taken, regarding the dissertation document cover (page 5 of the PDF with the rules). You are strongly advised to produce a one-page PDF with the cover and submit it to MEE Secretariat (Rosália Regueira) for validation before you submit the documents.
The dissertation must include the following declaration immediately before the sections: "Abstract", "Resumo", "Agradecimentos/Acknowledgements":
  • In Portuguese:
Declaração
Declaro que o presente documento é um trabalho original da minha autoria e que cumpre todos os requisitos do Código de Conduta e Boas Práticas da Universidade de Lisboa.
  • In English:
Declaration
I declare that this document is an original work of my own authorship and that it fulfills all the requirements of the Code of Conduct and Good Practices of the Universidade de Lisboa.

The rules for the extended abstract (which must be submitted together with the dissertation report) follow the IEEE Manuscript Templates for Conference Proceedings available here (use the A4 version).
A MEE alumnus (Nuno Rodrigues) developed a latex template for the dissertation for those that want to write their document in latex. His work was based on previous work by Prof. Rui Santos Cruz. Students can download and use the template which is shared on overleaf here.

Composition of the Evaluation Committees

For the PIC2 curricular course, the evaluation committee is composed by

  • a president (member of the MEE Scientific Coordination team),
  • the professors that supervised the student in the work and
  • additional members (nominated by the MEE Scientific Coordination team and that should not belong to the research group of the student supervisors).

While all student supervisors are part of the PIC2 evaluation committee, only one will be allowed to vote regarding the grade to be attributed by the committee.

For the DMEE, the evaluation committee is composed by

  • a president (member of the MEE Scientific Coordination team),
  • one professor that supervised the student in the work and
  • additional members (nominated by the MEE Scientific Coordination team and should not belong to the research group of the student supervisors).

Ideally, the president and the additional members should be the same that participated in the PIC2 evaluation of the student.


Public Presentation Sessions

The PIC2 and DMEE public sessions consist of the presentation of the work by the student (15 and 20 minutes presentation time, respectively) and discussion of the work by the evaluation committee

Students should carefully select the slides and the content they wish to present to the examination committee.
The slides should be numbered for easy reference and also indicate the total number of slides (as in slide 3/15). If the presentation has more than 15 slides, chances are, it will take more than 15 minutes to present (as a rule of thumb, consider one slide per minute).

Students should test the presentation to make sure those 15 minutes are not exceeded. The presentation may be cut off if the duration is exceeded. After the presentation, the examination committee will question the student.

Students are advised to test the presentation in the room, on the days before their scheduled evaluation, to make sure all figures and diagrams are clearly visible from the public point of view. On the presentation and discussion day, students must be present in the room well before their time slot.

The PIC2 complete examination will take about one hour while the DMEE cannot exceed one hour and thirty minutes.


Related Documents


  • Documentos PIC2 (only in Portuguese)
    • Proposta de Júri (as DOCX or PDF)
    • Acta do Júri com critérios de avaliação (as DOCX or PDF)


  • Documentos DMEE (only in Portuguese)
    • Acta do Júri (PDF)
    • Critérios de avaliação (PDF)