Information for graduate students
A lot of MSE graduate student specific information would be covered by either the MSE department (e.g., the Graduate Student Handbook, which is updated every few months) or the Graduate Student Council (MSE GSC). However, you might want to ask the group members on how they actually managed to do things. If this is the case, feel free to contact graduate students in the group! Aside from specific Q/A, there are some general guidelines (compiled from Anubhav, alumni, and current students) which can help you do better as a graduate student.
Preliminary Exam and Classwork
Q. Recommendations on what classes to enroll & How do I enroll in classes?
A. In general (but not always), a 1st-year MSE PhD student would want to take MSE classes in their first semester, especially considering that they would take a preliminary exam in January. MSE 201A is typically what most students take, feel free to take any other courses you want to learn/remind yourself of “broad” knowledge in Materials Science. Taking 1-3 classes in a semester would be general, but it is not very typical to take three or more courses a semester (you would probably want to get familiar with your project). You can also keep in mind that you can add/drop classes until some time after the semester begins. Basic instructions on signing in to classes is provided in below link: https://registrar.berkeley.edu/registration/enrollment
Here are some useful courses if you want to learn:
Core tenets of MSE: MSE200A, MSE202, MSE204, MSE201A, MSE223
Programming: CS61A and B
Machine learning: CS200, CS289, CS288, CS285 It’s also really helpful to take a course directly related to your research project as soon as possible. For example, if you’re working on catalysis, it is in your best interest to take the surfaces MSE class as soon as you can (preferably in your first semester).
Q. How to prepare for the preliminary exam at the end of the first semester?
A. The preliminary exam may be one of the most important things you need to deal with after you come here. It can also be a source of enormous stress if you are not prepared. The department will tell you about every rule of the exam, but they will not tell you much about how to actually prepare for the exam. Thus, it’s important to set aside a considerable amount of time to prepare thoroughly!
Here are some things to do if you want to ace the exam:
(Extremely important) Ask senior students about the content you should prepare for. Knowing everything about every subfield of MSE is impossible, so you need to narrow your focus. Many senior students have questions from previous exams; you should view these as soon as you can and structure your study loosely around them. For example, one thermodynamics examiner is notorious for examining students exclusively on Ellingham diagrams. If you went into the exam with a broad and impressive MSE knowledge but happened to not know how to read an Ellingham diagram, you would not do well.
(Extremely important) Organize with your colleagues to do practice (mock) preliminary exams. The exam itself is about MSE knowledge, but also - surprisingly - about keeping your composure while presenting complex information. Practicing in front of others and fielding their questions in real-time is the most effective way of validating your study. This practice will improve your ability to think on your feet and will identify your weaknesses.
(Extremely important) Know the fundamentals for all the areas flawlessly. You don’t need to be up on the latest research to do well on the prelim, but you do need to know fundamental equations and ideas very thoroughly. For a characterization example, you probably don’t need to know every detail of how angle-resolved photoemission spectroscopy instruments work, but you should be able to explain diffraction and Bragg’s Law very very well. The best way to do this is to read relevant textbooks and do some of the exercises.
Ask faculty examiners which books they recommend. You don’t need to read the entire books, but you should at least read (and understand!) the chapters related to the previous questions.
During the exam, answer questions simply. Answering with more detail (esp. about topics you are not 100% confident in) is not always better. Providing extra details often encourages examiners to ask much more difficult questions.
If you are asked something you don’t know, don’t say “I don’t know” without follow up. Say “I’m not sure, but…” and then give your best guess at an answer based on things you definitely know. You can also ask questions to your examiner to clarify the questions.
(Very important) During the exam, never give up! Occasionally you will get taken into deep water and be totally lost; during these times, it’s important to keep your cool and keep answering things to the best of your ability (without making things up or wildly guessing). I have never met someone who had a perfect prelim exam, and I have known many people who had one or two disastrous sections and still passed. Continuing to engage with your examiners (asking for clarification, giving an educated guess, etc.) instead of giving up will drastically increase your chances of passing the exam.
For those who didn’t graduate from Material Science, don’t worry too much since you can learn everything quickly during the preparation. For those who had a MSE degree, don’t be overconfident. It is likely you cannot remember what you learned 2 or 3 years ago in undergraduate study. Again, start the preparation as early as you can. I suggest starting the readings halfway into the semester and starting oral practice 2 or 3 weeks before the exam.
Some students may fail the exam. Don't panic since you have a second chance in summer. I know it is stressful to take the exam again but you can make it. The form of preparation for the second exam is the same as the first one. Just read and practice!
As far as classes go, the survey course MSE200A is a great choice for those new to MSE, as it will give you a good overview.
For specific topic areas, the following courses are particularly useful.
Characterization: MSE 204
Materials properties: MSE 223
Bonding and structure: MSE 223, MSE 202
Thermo and phase: MSE 201A
Mechanical: MSE200A (this survey class is often more useful than MSEC211/C212 for the topic matter in the exam)
Qualifying Exam
Berkeley doesn’t have a formal doctoral defense, so a lot of the stress and pressure is focused instead on the qualifying exam, where you essentially have to do 3 things:
Demonstrate competence in your research field and fundamentals
Defend your past research
Defend a reasonable proposal for future research The qualifying exam is probably the most difficult part of the program. Not to worry, though. If you have been making research progress over your first few years, and if you dedicate some time to preparing your presentation, you have nothing to worry about.
Q. How do I get more information about the qualifying exam?
A. Check the MSE Graduate Student handbook. There are lots of details in there as far as formal procedures go.
Q. When should I start preparing for the qualifying exam?
A. Students usually take the qualifying exam between their 2nd and 3rd years. There is some flexibility in the timing, but the longer you delay it, the more stressful it becomes, as more is expected of you (this is coming from someone who took it at the end of his 5th year!). If you have published a paper with the group, this is probably a good sign you should prepare for the qualifying exam sometime within the next year. Once you have the exam scheduled, you should have at least 1.5 months to prepare. Having 2-3 months (or longer) is better (and far less stressful). More specifically, you should consult with Anubhav (and your UC Berkeley advisor, e.g. Gerd or Kristin) to determine if you are ready!
Q. How do I actually schedule the qualifying exam?
A. You need to first identify your committee members according to the requirements in the MSE Grad Student handbook. You should come up with a concise (~ a short paragraph) proposal for your topic as well. You consult with Anubhav and your UC Berkeley advisor (Gerd, Kristin, etc.) to make sure your topics and examiners make sense. Once you do these things, you can actually schedule the exam. Scheduling the qualifying exam is sometimes more difficult than the exam itself. You’ll need to email your exam committee with at least a few months (if not more) of lead time to figure out when they can all meet during a common time slot. Tools like when2meet and Doodle are very useful for this purpose. It’s generally ok to reschedule for good reasons, but try not to! You’ll also need to file some formal paperwork according to the MSE GS manual declaring your committee and topic.
Q. How should I prepare my presentation and proposal?
A. As prerequisites, you should:
First, be very strong on the fundamental science on which your research relies. Know the core equations by heart. The best way to do this is to read textbooks and review article intro sections.
Have an overview of the current research in the field. It doesn’t have to be comprehensive, but it should be decent. Know the core strengths and weaknesses of other groups’ research as it relates to yours. Don’t be afraid to form your own opinions!
Have a clear scientific motive (i.e., a research question) for the work you’re doing and strong justification for the methods you’re using to do it. You’ll know your research topic is clear if you are able to phrase it as a single sentence.
As far as the presentation and proposal goes, everyone has their own style of presentation. However, there are a few general guidelines that might help keep you on track:
Ease your examiners into the presentation. Your committee will likely be made up of experts from several different fields, and they likely won’t know everything about all the topics your presentation covers. Start with some easy slides demonstrating a clear motive for the work you are doing. Having your examiners be confused is a bad thing; they’ll ask more difficult questions and be more angry with you. Most questions for your exam will be loaded towards the beginning, so it is better to have the slides be easily defended than overly complex, especially at the start.
Keep it simple. Every word and figure on your slides must be defended. Having less on your slides is better. If you don’t know what a plot or equation really means, don’t include it. You can always move extra info to the backup slides. If you do want to include more complexity on a particular slide, at least begin with a simple idea and evolve it into a more complex idea as you explain the slide.
Propose a clear, succinct scientific objective. First and foremost, examiners want to know that you know what you’re doing and why. If you cannot concisely state your objectives, it suggests you don’t understand what you’re doing. Almost every professor I have talked to says that this is the biggest factor in preventing your qual from going sideways.
Emphasize your past work. If you have published work, you should emphasize it!
Demonstrate novelty of your approach with respect to past work. You should show your work has significant advantages over what others have done in the past. Otherwise, why would you be doing it?
Be forthcoming with the limitations of your approach. All methods (computational or experimental) have limitations. Examiners mostly care not about the limitations themselves (as long as they’re not crucial), but rather that you know the limitations of your approach. When you explain your slides/proposal, come right out and say how the methods are limited before they ask. This will demonstrate you are a critical thinker and competent researcher.
Schedule at least one practice exam. You can recruit as many people as you want (Alex has seen practice exams with 30+ people in them), but the most helpful practice is usually more focused (3-6 people). You should also ask your practice examiners to be as critical/argumentative as possible rather than listening to your presentation and asking 1-2 questions at the end. “Overly” critical practice is much more representative of the actual qual.
Q. Is there a particular way I should prepare the written proposal?
A. Aside from the guidelines in the MSE GS manual, not really. Just make sure it presents basically the same information as is in your presentation. You can explicitly include sections like “Background”, “Research Question”, “Previous Work”, and “Proposed Work” for clarity. You can also be a bit more detailed in the written proposal (e.g., cite previous work comprehensively) than in the presentation.
In general, the proposal is not as important as the presentation itself. However, since most of your examiners will read/skim the proposal before the presentation, making a good impression on your examiners with the proposal is a good idea. If your proposal is sloppy, unclear, or fundamentally flawed, your examiners will likely come to your presentation with much more scrutiny.
Q. Is there a particular way I should answer questions during the exam?
A. Yes. Here’s some examples. Examiner: “Have you considered using instead of you propose here?”
Bad answer: “Uhhm, well, no. My advisor said we should use . I remember seeing is really good for this kind of problem.” Good answer: “Yes, in fact we have looked into but it was limited because of . In particular, <reason 1> causes the accuracy to be far off, often more than 200%. A recent study by Author et al. showed was both less accurate and more expensive than across solids. So, despite the fact requires empirical fitting and has problems like , it seems like the best approach at this time. However, I’m definitely open to suggestions - what do you think about ?” Examiner: “I disagree with your conclusions on this slide. isn’t supportedbecause of . Can you explain more why you think is supported?
Bad answer: “Oh, you’re right. I don’t know why I put that in here. Sorry…” Good answer: “I understand can be a point of contention because of . However, even counting I believe it is reasonable because of . More, Author2 et al. showed this kind of analysis still yields practical design principles although they are less rigorously derived. I suppose if we were to be particularly rigorous, we could amend to be . Then we would have accounted for . Does this seem more reasonable to you?”
Q. Anything else to watch out for?
A. File your paperwork early. Alex filed his paperwork (literally) 3 minutes before the exam and that was almost a catastrophic mistake. Also, relax! If you are well prepared, you truly have nothing to worry about. The examiners are mostly trying to help you, and they want to see you succeed. A lot of their advice may be useful for your research project.
Dissertation
To be filled in!
Here are very basic things you might be wondering in a Q&A format:
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