The PhD programme in Plant Biology has been taught at the University of Murcia since 1988. It aims to provide top-level scientific training in the field of Physiology and Plant Biotechnology, and arises from the lecturing and research experience of lecturers from the Department of Plant Biology at the University of Murcia (UMU), the Centre for Edaphology and Applied Biology of the Segura of the Spanish National Research Council (CEBAS-CSIC) and the Agrarian and Food Research & Development Institute of Murcia (IMIDA). These organisations have collaborated in different research lines over the years as well as in teaching the official master’s degree in Biotechnology and Plant Stress Biology at the University of Murcia, which is considered as the training period for this doctorate.
Students who enrol in this programme, which is run in collaboration with the CEBAS-CSIC and the IMIDA will be in contact with people from different research centres. They will have the opportunity to complete their theses in research centres other than the University of Murcia, as well as to take part in mobility stays in national or foreign research centres. Within the PhD programme, students will enhance their creativity and develop their research skills and critical spirit; they will also become more responsible and improve their participation and teamwork skills by focusing on theoretical, practical and technical knowledge, having a first-hand contact with experimental problems, learning research techniques and by using high performance equipment.
The doctoral programme includes specific research lines that cover several aspects of the general research line in Physiology and Plant Biotechnology that doctoral students can join to carry out their doctoral thesis. The different research lines are related to the effects of unfavourable environmental effects on plants such as water stress, salt stress, nutrient stress, pathogens, etc.) or plant biotechnology (genetic improvement in plants, metabolite production, etc.), which in many cases also correspond to specific economic problems of the Region of Murcia.
