Chemical and Biological Engineering Program
The Chemical and Biological Engineering (CBE) degree program in KAUST offers students MS and PhD degree in Chemical and Biological Engineering.
The program has the following two major tracks:
- Advanced Chemical Engineering, including specializations in membrane technologies, process engineering, energy engineering, product engineering and advanced process technology.
- Advanced Biological Engineering, including specializations in bioenergy, biotherapeutics and the environment.
The two tracks together cover a broad range of modern advanced chemical and biological engineering and should equip a student for a successful and productive career in these fields. The following courses are elaborately designed to systematically cover not only the basic fundamentals, but also the science and technologies that reflect the modern trends in these fields.
Core courses for both tracks are as follows:- Applied Engineering Thermodynamics (CBE 201)
- Fundamentals of Cell Biology (CBE 224)
- Applied Partial Differential Equations (AMCS 231)
CBE 202, CBE 203, CBE 204, CBE 336
Advanced Chemical Engineering Electives
| CBE 210, | CBE 211, | CBE 212, | CBE 213, | CBE 214, | CBE 215, | CBE 216 |
| CBE 218, | CBE 219, | CBE 230, | CBE 226, | CBE 231, | CBE 237, | CBE 311; |
| CBE 312, | CBE 313, | CBE 314, | CBE 315, | CBE 317, | CBE 334 |
Advanced Biological Engineering Specialization Courses
CBE 221, CBE 222, CBE 223, CBE 336
Advanced Biological Engineering Electives
| CBE 205, | CBE 206, | CBE 207, | CBE 208, | CBE 209, | CBE 219, | CBE 226 |
| CBE 231, | CBE 232, | CBE 233, | CBE 234, | CBE 235, | CBE 237, | CBE 239 |
| CBE 304, | CBE 317, | CBE 331, | CBE 332, | CBE 333, | CBE 334 |
A student seeking a degree in chemical and biological engineering must specify one track. The MS Students must complete 2 core courses, 2 specialization courses and minimum of 3 elective courses that are designated in that track, and one cognate course. For Ph.D students, 2 courses in 300-level are required. All courses (including core modules) on a track are available as electives for students taking the other track.
Master Degree requirements
CBE provides two options for Master’s program: Master with non-thesis and master with thesis. Students must indicate their choice to the program coordinator within 6 months after enrolled in CBE program.
Students who take the thesis option must find a thesis supervisor from a KAUST faculty member within 6 months after enrolling in CBE program. If the thesis supervisor is not a CBE faculty, a co-supervisor from CBE degree program is highly recommended. Normally, students must fulfill all the requirements for master degree within 12 months for non-thesis option, and 18 months for the thesis option.
Extension of the studying period must be approved by the degree program coordinator case-by-case.
Graduation with a MS degree in Chemical and Biological Engineering (CBE) requires completion of a minimum of 30 credit units with a cumulative GPA of 3.0. A minimum of 24 units of course work credits are required including 2 core courses, 2 specialization courses, minimum of 3 elective courses designated in one track, and a cognate course.
The cognate course is a course offered by another degree program in KAUST, normally refers to a Math/Stats course. However, students who take AMCS 231 as one of their core courses will not need to take another cognate course. Students must achieve a grade of B- or above in any of their courses, otherwise the course must be repeated.
For non-thesis option, a minimum of 3 credits of directed research (CBE 299) is required. For thesis option, the student must complete a thesis under the supervision of a KAUST faculty member in CBE or a co-supervisor in CBE and minimum 12 credits of thesis research (CBE 297) are required. The thesis must be evaluated and approved by a thesis committee which is consists of the thesis advisor(s) and at least two other KAUST faculty members. The thesis advisor will be the coordinator of the committee.
Seminar requirement
Registration in the CBE seminar course (CBE 298, 1 credit) is compulsive in each residence semester. At least 80% of attendance to all seminar series is required to fulfill the course requirement. However, the credit earned for the seminar course will not be counted toward the total credit requirement.
PhD degree requirements
Students in the PhD degree program must find a KAUST faculty member as their academic supervisor within 12 months after enrolling in the CBE program. If the academic supervisor is not a CBE faculty, a co-supervisor from the CBE degree program is highly recommended.
There are three possible entry points into the CBE PhD degree program: (i) students possessing a MS degree in CBE or a related engineering or science field; (ii) KAUST students pursuing a seamless CBE MS/PhD; (iii) and students possessing a BSc degree. The seamless MS/PhD option is intended for MS students who decide, within 12 months after joining KAUST, to pursue a PhD; this option allows a student to begin to satisfy PhD requirements (e.g., coursework) while completing their MS requirements. The only difference between the seamless MS option and the BSc entry is that the latter does not acquire a MS degree on the way to a PhD degree.
A minimum of 6 units of PhD coursework (300-level) is required beyond the MS degree. For students who enter with a BSc degree, 30 additional units are required, equivalent to MS degree coursework excluding a thesis. In the case of the MS degree being from another major/degree program, there may be additional deficiency courses specified by the advisor. Courses designated should be relevant to the dissertation topic, if defined, and/or proposed general area of research. A minimum cumulative GPA of 3.0 must be achieved. Passing grade for each course is B; otherwise the course must be re-taken.
Besides the coursework (6 or more units), 60 units of dissertation research (CBE 397) credit must be earned. A full-time workload for PhD students is considered to be 12 credit units per semester (courses and CBE 397) and 6 credit units in summer (CBE 397). There is a minimum residency requirement (enrollment period at KAUST) of 2.5 years for students entering with a MS degree, 3.5 years for a BSc degree. The maximum enrollment period is 5.0 years, extendable upon approval of both the faculty research advisor and degree program coordinator.
Two milestones must be reached in time before a student successfully obtains a PhD degree from Chemical and Biological Engineering: (i) successful pass of the research proposal examination and (ii) successful pass of the dissertation examination. The maximum time to achieve the first milestone for a student entering with an MS degree is 18 months, and 24 months for the BSc-degree entry option. The maximum time to achieve the second milestone for all students is 5 years. Extension of the studying period must be approved case-by-case by both the faculty research advisor and the degree program coordinator.
To reach the first milestone, the student must meet the following requirements:- successfully pass of all the required PhD coursework
- designate a research advisor
The research proposal examination is an oral exam administered by the student’s research proposal examination committee which includes the students academic supervisor(s) and at least three other KAUST faculty members, one of whom must be external to the CBE degree program. Students must contact each committee member and arrange for a suitable time and place for the exam, and inform the graduate program coordinator at least 2 weeks prior to the date chosen for the exam.
The student must submit the research proposal to the committee at least two weeks prior to the examination. The examination may begin with a 30 ~ 45 min presentation by the student; followed by a 15 min question session to answer any questions that might be raised from the committee.
The result of the exam will be made based on the recommendation of the examination committee. There are four possible outcomes:- Pass: the student passes the exam and may proceed to independent study and research for the doctoral degree.
- Conditional pass: the students may be required to provide additional information. If approved by the proposal exam committee, the exam can be passed without another oral exam.
- Failure with retake: The student must prepare a new research proposal and be orally examined again within the next six weeks.
- Failure: The student is not qualified for further PhD studies.
- The student must have completed all the course work requirement
- The student must have completed 60 dissertation credits.
- The student must have passed the research proposal examination at least one year before.
The dissertation examination committee shall consist of a minimum of four members, one of whom should be a KAUST faculty member external to the CBE degree program. Passing the dissertation examination is achieved by acceptance of a written dissertation and an open oral defense thereof. The student must contact each committee member to arrange for a suitable time and place for the examination, and inform the degree program coordinator at least 4 weeks prior to the date chosen for the exam. The student must submit the written dissertation to the committee at least two weeks prior to the final exam. The examination begins with 45-min presentation followed a 10~15 min open question session for the student to answer any questions which may arise from audience, and followed by another 15~20 min close question session, where the student should clarify or defend any questions related to the dissertation or other academic related matters.
The result of the exam will be made based on the recommendation of the committee. There are four possible outcomes:
- Pass: the student passes the exam, and the dissertation is accepted as submitted.
- Pass with revisions: the student passes the exam, but the dissertation need to be revised based on the suggestions raised from the committee.
- Failure with retake: The student must do more research to fulfill the research topic. The student must revise the dissertation, and take another oral examination within six months.
- Failure: the student is not qualified to obtain a PhD degree from KAUST.
Transfer Students
Students transferring from other PhD programs may receive some dissertation research and coursework credit units, on a case by case basis, for related work performed at their original institution. However, such students must still satisfy the written and oral requirements for a research proposal (if this phase was passed at the original institute, the proposal may be the same, if approved by the research advisor).
The minimum residency requirement for enrollment of such students at KAUST is 2 years.