ohio state university phd electrical engineering

Graduate-Level DEI Course in Engineering Education

PhD Program Contacts

For more information:

Tracy Hanson Graduate Program Coordinator [email protected]

Rachel Kajfez, Ph.D. Graduate Studies Chair [email protected]

.cls-1{fill:#a91e22;}.cls-2{fill:#c2c2c2;} double-arrow Explore our program

The Ohio State University Department of Engineering Education is actively looking for interested graduate students to join the growing number of students in the EED Graduate Program by reaching out to recent graduates from engineering, sciences, and STEM education programs as well as working professionals who want to shift their career focus (e.g., industry engineers, government agency scientists, high school science teachers).

The job market for engineering education doctoral graduates includes:

• Universities, colleges, community and technical colleges (both in tenure-track and clinical faculty appointments)
• Corporate training organizations

Interested in joining the program? Quickly find the information you're looking for by using the quick links to the right. 

Can't find what you're looking for? Email Tracy Hanson , our graduate program coordinator, if you have additional questions or concerns. 

There are currently no upcoming events to display.

• Future Students
• Parents/Families
• Alumni/Friends
• Current Students
• Faculty/Staff
• MyOHIO Student Center
• Visit Athens Campus
• Regional Campuses
• OHIO Online
• Faculty/Staff Directory

Electrical Engineering and Computer Science

• Accreditation
• Advisory Board
• Faculty Recruiting
• Undergraduate Programs
• Graduate Programs
• Faculty Research
• Avionics Engineering Center
• Research Opportunities
• Research Labs
• Student Laboratories

Helpful Links

Navigate OHIO

Connect With Us

PH.D. in Electrical Engineering and Computer Science

Ph.D. students will pursue a traditional course of academic requirements and supervised independent research. The program consists of required coursework, and a three-part comprehensive examination consisting of a written exam, oral exam, and Ph.D. dissertation proposal defense, followed by approximately 2 years of research, and successful defense of the Ph.D. dissertation.

Ph.D. in Electrical Engineering and Computer Science Guidelines - Fall 2014 or Later (.pdf)

Course Catalog page

Questions? Contact the School of Electrical Engineering and Computer Graduate Programs Office at  [email protected]   or 740.593.1922.

Electrical Engineering PhD

The Electrical Engineering PhD program studies systems that sense, analyze, and interact with the world. You will learn how this practice is based on fundamental science and mathematics, creating opportunities for both theoretical and experimental research. Electrical engineers invent devices for sensing and actuation, designing physical substrates for computation, creating algorithms for analysis and control, and expanding the theory of information processing. You will get to choose from a wide range of research areas such as circuits and VLSI, computer engineering and architecture, robotics and control, and signal processing.

Electrical engineers at SEAS are pursuing work on integrated circuits for cellular biotechnology, millimeter-scale robots, and the optimization of smart power groups. Examples of projects current and past students have worked on include developing methods to trace methane emissions and improving models for hurricane predictions.

APPLY NOW >

PhD in Electrical Engineering Degree

Harvard School of Engineering offers a  Doctor of Philosophy (Ph.D.)  degree in Engineering Sciences: Electrical Engineering , conferred through the Harvard Kenneth C. Griffin Graduate School of Arts and Sciences (Harvard Griffin GSAS). Prospective students apply through the Harvard Griffin GSAS. In the online application, select  “Engineering and Applied Sciences” as your program choice and select " PhD Engineering Sciences: Electrical Engineering ​."

The Electrical Engineering program does not offer an independent Masters Degree.

Electrical Engineering PhD Career Paths

Graduates of the program have gone on to a range of careers in industry in companies such as Tesla, Microsoft HoloLens, and IBM. Others have positions in academia at the University of Maryland, University of Michigan, and University of Colorado.

Admissions & Academic Requirements

Prospective students apply through the Harvard Kenneth C. Griffin Graduate School of Arts and Sciences (Harvard Griffin GSAS). In the online application, select  “Engineering and Applied Sciences” as your program choice and select "PhD Engineering Sciences: Electrical Engineering​." Please review the  admissions requirements and other information  before applying. Our website also provides  admissions guidance ,   program-specific requirements , and a  PhD program academic timeline .

Academic Background

Applicants typically have bachelor’s degrees in the natural sciences, mathematics, computer science, or engineering. In the application for admission, select “Engineering and Applied Sciences” as your degree program choice and your degree and area of interest from the “Area of Study“ drop-down. PhD applicants must complete the Supplemental SEAS Application Form as part of the online application process.

Standardized Tests

GRE General: Not Accepted

Electrical Engineering Faculty & Research Areas

View a list of our electrical engineering  faculty  and electrical engineering  affiliated research areas , Please note that faculty members listed as “Affiliates" or "Lecturers" cannot serve as the primary research advisor.  

Electrical Engineering Centers & Initiatives

View a list of the research  centers & initiatives  at SEAS and the  electrical engineering faculty engagement with these entities .

Graduate Student Clubs

Graduate student clubs and organizations bring students together to share topics of mutual interest. These clubs often serve as an important adjunct to course work by sponsoring social events and lectures. Graduate student clubs are supported by the Harvard Kenneth C. Griffin School of Arts and Sciences. Explore the list of active clubs and organizations .

Funding and Scholarship

Learn more about financial support for PhD students.

• How to Apply

Learn more about how to apply  or review frequently asked questions for prospective graduate students.

In Electrical Engineering

• Undergraduate Engineering at Harvard
• Concentration Requirements
• How to Declare
• Who are my Advisors?
• Sophomore Forum
• ABET Information
• Senior Thesis
• Research for Course Credit (ES 91R)
• AB/SM Information
• Peer Concentration Advisors (PCA) Program
• Student Organizations
• PhD Timeline
• PhD Model Program (Course Guidelines)
• Qualifying Exam
• Committee Meetings
• Committee on Higher Degrees
• Research Interest Comparison
• Collaborations
• Cross-Harvard Engagement
• Seminar Series
• Clubs & Organizations
• Centers & Initiatives
• Alumni Stories

The Ohio State University

• BuckeyeLink
• Search Ohio State

ISE Graduate Handbook 2024-2025: Appendix B Operations Research Qualifying Exam

This section outlines the policies and guidelines for the PhD qualifying exam for PhD students in the Operations Research program. Exceptions are described at the end of the section for students who needed to retake the old format, i.e., written qualifying exam.

The goal of this oral exam is to ensure PhD students have:

• Sufficient core background in Operations Research in order to make good progress towards the Candidacy Examination.
• Some preliminary experience with an ISE faculty research advisor, demonstrating a basic ability to identify and explore a research area.

The exam material is based on all courses listed as Fundamentals for Ph.D. Students in the OR grad curriculum sheet .

Exam timeline and scheduling

Scheduling timeline

Students must take their qualifying exam before the end of the 1st semester of their 2nd year in the PhD program . For students starting in Autumn, this is the autumn semester of their second year in the program. For students starting in Spring, this is the spring semester of their second year in the program. It is suggested that the exam is scheduled during the 2nd semester of the 1st year, if possible, for timely progress. Exceptions will be considered on an individual basis.

Two qualifying exam attempts are allowed. If asked to retake the exam, the second attempt must be scheduled in the semester following the first attempt. Failure to schedule the exam according to this timeline will be counted as a failure. Students are allowed to take their exams ahead of this timeline with their advisor’s approval.

Exams can take place at any time during the year subject to the approval of the Qualifying exam committee.

All PhD students, who have not passed the exam by the 2nd week of the 3rd semester, should file an application to graduate for an MS degree with the graduate school prior to the deadline in their third semester (3rd Friday), assuming they will have completed the 30 credit hours required for a MS degree at the end the third semester. This will allow them to receive a MS degree that semester, assuming they complete the MS degree requirements, even if they don’t pass the exam. Students entering with a MS degree, which is supplying 30 credit hours towards their PhD degree, will need to cancel their application to graduate when passing the exam so that their prior MS degree will still count towards their PhD credits hours

Scheduling procedure

Students should fill out the “ISE OR Request for the PhD Qualifying Exam” form by the third Friday of the semester in which their exam is to be scheduled. This form, along with the student’s advising report, should be emailed to the ISE graduate program coordinator. The advising report 24 should show that the student has already taken, or is currently taking, all the OR PhD required courses (see also the “Results” section below for more information).

Exam format and guidelines

Oral exam committee members

The Qualifying exam committee will consist of three ISE OR faculty members. The student’s advisor will be on the committee. One of the other two members will come from the “Probabilistic” area and the other will come from the “Deterministic” area. Both will be selected by a person designated by the OR faculty. These committee nominees will be to the Graduate Studies Chair for final approval. Currently, the person designated by the OR faculty is the liaison between the department chair and the OR faculty. If there is some faculty member who is considered unacceptable to the student or advisor, this fact along with justification should be communicated to the designated OR faculty member who is making the selections.

Oral examination procedures

The exam will be a 90-minute oral exam. It consists of a 10-minute presentation by the student, followed by 80 minutes of questions/answers from the committee.

The 10-minute presentation will be an uninterrupted presentation on a research problem chosen by the student and their advisor. The student may present their ongoing research work, if any. Alternatively, the student will start working on a research problem with their advisor at the beginning of the semester in which they are taking the oral exam, and present their progress (e.g., problem statement, brief literature review, and/or a proposed solution approach) during the 10- minute presentation.

The presentation will be followed by 20 minutes of questions by each committee member, followed by a second round of questions by any committee member. These will be on fundamental knowledge and basics from the ISE OR coursework and will cover all the three main areas (i.e., Statistics, Stochastics, and Optimization). The questions need not be on or related to the presentation.

Upon completion of the oral exam, each committee member will provide one of the following three scores:

• 2 (pass): Student shows good knowledge of fundamental concepts covered in the ISE OR coursework, as well as ability to apply this knowledge and propose solutions to (openended) research problems.
• 1 (marginal): Student shows overall knowledge of fundamental concepts from coursework and some ability to solve research problems. However, student has difficulty when solving questions posed from coursework and/or extending this knowledge to propose solutions to research problems.
• 0 (fail): Student has difficulty in recalling fundamental concepts and/or answering questions from the ISE OR coursework and/or approaching research problems.

To pass the qualifying exam, the student should receive (a) a cumulative score of 4-6 in the oral exam, and (b) satisfactory grades on the OR PhD required courses. Failure to meet either of these two criteria (i.e., a cumulative score of 0-3 in the oral exam, and/or subpar performance in the required courses) will lead to failing the qualifying exam.

Individualized recourse plans will be proposed by the committee for students who fail to pass the exam. This may include taking additional courses in one or more of the three exam areas and obtaining a minimum grade of B+ in each course or retaking the exam in the next semester.

If a second exam is required, it is expected that all members of the new Qualifying exam committee will be different, except for the advisor.

Exceptions for Students Who Have Taken the (Previous) Written Exam

Exception: students with a conditional pass during previous Qualifying Exams will not be required to do the 10-minute presentation. They will only answer questions to a (smaller size) committee in the area in which they received a conditional pass. For instance, if the student had already passed optimization in Spring 2022, then the optimization section will be removed from the exam: 20 minutes will be removed from the exam length, and the committee will have 1 less member assigned. Such students are expected to complete the new qualifying exam by Autumn 2023.

The Ohio State University

• BuckeyeLink
• Search Ohio State

Gene therapy relieves back pain, repairs damaged disc in mice

Disc-related back pain may one day meet its therapeutic match: gene therapy delivered by naturally derived nanocarriers that, a new study shows, repairs damaged discs in the spine and lowers pain symptoms in mice. 

Scientists engineered nanocarriers using mouse connective-tissue cells called  fibroblasts  as a model of skin cells and loaded them with genetic material for a protein key to tissue development. The team injected a solution containing the carriers into damaged discs in mice at the same time the back injury occurred. 

Assessing outcomes over 12 weeks, researchers found through imaging, tissue analysis, and mechanical and behavioral tests that the gene therapy restored structural integrity and function to degenerated discs and reduced signs of back pain in the animals. 

“We have this unique strategy that’s able to both regenerate tissue and inhibit some symptoms of pain,” said co-senior author  Devina Purmessur Walter , associate professor of  biomedical engineering  at The Ohio State University. 

Though there is more to learn, the findings suggest gene therapy could offer an effective and long-lasting alternative to opioids for the management of debilitating back pain. 

“This can be used at the same time as surgery to actually boost healing of the disc itself,” said co-senior author  Natalia Higuita-Castro , associate professor of biomedical engineering and  neurological surgery  at Ohio State. “Your own cells are actually doing the work and going back to a healthy state.” 

The study was published online recently in the journal  Biomaterials . 

An estimated 40% of low-back pain cases are attributed to degeneration of the cushiony intervertebral discs that absorb shocks and provide flexibility to the spine, previous research suggests. And while trimming away bulging tissue from a herniated disc during surgery typically reduces pain, it does not repair the disc itself – which continues to degenerate with the passage of time. 

“Once you take a piece away, the tissue decompresses like a flat tire,” Purmessur Walter said. “The disease process continues, and impacts the other discs on either side because you’re losing that pressure that is critical for spinal function. Clinicians don’t have a good way of addressing that.” 

This new study builds upon previous work in Higuita-Castro’s lab, which reported a year ago that nanocarriers called extracellular vesicles loaded with anti-inflammatory cargo  curbed tissue injury in damaged mouse lungs . The engineered carriers are replicas of the natural extracellular vesicles that circulate in humans’ bloodstream and biological fluids, carrying messages between cells. 

To create the vesicles, scientists apply an electrical charge to a donor cell to transiently open holes in its membrane, and deliver externally obtained DNA inside that converts to a specific protein, as well as molecules that prompt the manufacture of even more of a functional protein. 

In this study, the cargo consisted of material to produce a “pioneer” transcription factor protein called  FOXF1 , which is important in the development and growth of tissues. 

“Our concept is recapitulating development: FOXF1 is expressed during development and in healthy tissue, but it decreases with age,” Purmessur Walter said. “We’re basically trying to trick the cells and give them a boost back to their developmental state when they’re growing and at their healthiest.” 

In experiments, mice with injured discs treated with FOXF1 nanocarriers were compared to injured mice given saline or mock nanocarriers and uninjured mice. 

Compared to controls, the discs in mice receiving gene therapy showed a host of improvements: The tissue plumped back up and became more stable through production of a protein that holds water and other matrix proteins, all helping promote range of motion, load bearing and flexibility in the spine. Behavioral tests showed the therapy decreased symptoms of pain in mice, though these responses differed by sex – males and females showed varying levels of susceptibility to pain based on the types of movement being assessed. 

The findings speak to the value of using universal adult donor cells to create these extracellular vesicle therapies, the researchers said, because they don’t carry the risk of generating an immune response. The gene therapy also, ideally, would function as a one-time treatment – a therapeutic gift that keeps on giving. 

“The idea of cell reprogramming is that you express this transcription factor and the cell is then going to convert to this healthier state and stays committed to that healthier phenotype – and that conversion is not normally transient,” Higuita-Castro said. “So in theory, you would not expect to have to re-dose significantly.” 

There are more experiments to come, testing the effects of other transcription factors that contribute to intervertebral disc development. And because this first study used young adult mice, the team also plans to test the therapy’s effects in older animals that model age-related degeneration and, eventually, in clinical trials for larger animals known to develop back problems. 

Higuita-Castro, director of advanced therapeutics and engineering in the College of Medicine  Davis Heart and Lung Research Institute  and a core faculty member of Ohio State’s  Gene Therapy Institute , and Purmessur Walter, an investigator in Ohio State’s  Spine Research Institute  and director of the  Spinal Therapeutics Laboratory  in the College of Engineering, are co-principal investigators on National Institutes of Health grants funding this research. 

Additional co-authors include co-first authors Shirley Tang and Ana Salazar-Puerta, Mary Heimann, Kyle Kuchynsky, María Rincon-Benavides, Mia Kordowski, Gilian Gunsch, Lucy Bodine, Khady Diop, Connor Gantt, Safdar Khan, Anna Bratasz, Olga Kokiko-Cochran, Julie Fitzgerald and Benjamin Walter, all of Ohio State; Damien Laudier of Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai; and Judith Hoyland of the University of Manchester. 

Ohio State has filed a patent application on nonviral gene therapy for minimally invasively treating painful musculoskeletal disorders.

Related News

Stress (Mild, Moderate, Severe) Who Can I Talk To?

.cls-1{fill:#a91e22;}.cls-2{fill:#c2c2c2;} double-arrow moderate to severe.

When in Doubt, Call University Police: 614-292-2121

Suicide:  Local 24/7 Suicide Prevention Lifeline  614.221.5445

National 24/7 Suicide Prevention Lifeline  988

Veterans Crisis Line  800.273.8255 , press 1  or text  838255

Crisis Text Line:  Text “HOPE” to  741741

OSU Suicide Prevention  Where to Get Help

OSU Counseling and Consultation Service 614.292.5766

OSU Psychological Services Center

1835 Neil Avenue Columbus, Ohio 43210

Phone:  614-292-2345 Fax:  614-292-4537 Email:  [email protected]

Sexual Assault Response Network of Central Ohio (SARNCO)

OSU Office: Jeff Pufter, 614-788-4716

Hotline:  (614) 267-7020

.cls-1{fill:#a91e22;}.cls-2{fill:#c2c2c2;} double-arrow Mild (Important but manageable)

Disability Services  for resources with test anxiety

On-Demand Services  

including  Let's Talk  a 15-20 minute informal consultation  with a professional counselor on staff from Counseling and Consultation Services (CCS),  Drop-in Workshop   info, and online videos, podcasts, and resources

Recreational Sports  

There are lots of fitness facilities included with student fees paid each semester.

St udent Wellness Center  RPAC 337, Annie & John Glenn Avenue  Office Locations

The  Recreational and Physical Activity Center  houses the main location of the Student Life Student Wellness Center. Walk straight through the main floor entry gates and the Student Wellness Center is located on your right in Suite B130.

The  Physical Activity and Education Services  building houses  Wellness Coaching  and  Financial Coaching . Take the elevator to the 4th floor and the office suite is just off the elevator in Suite 445 PAES.

Baker Hall  houses the  Collegiate Recovery Community   (CRC) also part of the Wellness Center. The CRC is located in 95 Baker Hall. When you enter the front door, you will see the CRC to the right on the first floor directly across from Disability Services.

SMART LAB  (Stress Management and Resiliency Lab)

SMART LAB Uses biofeedback to reduce stress and anxiety

The Student Wellness Center has an interactive online  resource guide