During the course of study, students carry out two research projects, each worth 10 CP, under the responsibility of a member of the teaching staff of the Faculty of Science or the teaching staff of the Department of Biomedicine, the Department of Biomedical Engineering, the Friedrich Miescher Institute for Biomedical Research, or the Swiss Tropical and Public Health Institute. Each of the two projects usually lasts three months. The project work can be carried out 2/3 part-time, so that courses can be attended during the project in the remaining 1/3 of the student's working time. The topic of the project work needs to be in the subject area Physics of Life. The two research projects and the master's thesis can be carried out in the same research group or in different research groups. Each research project is completed with a final written report and a presentation to the research group.

The assessment of student performance in the two research projects is carried out by entering a learning contract in the online services of the University of Basel (for the acquisition of credit points outside the regular course offerings). The learning contract specifies the topic, content, duration, form and scope of the performance assessment, any revision and repetition options, the number of credit points that can be earned as well as the type of assessment and the allocation of the credits to a specific module. The learning contract is approved by the student, the responsible faculty member, and the chairperson of the teaching committee before the project work begins. Each research project is assessed as pass/fail. 

About the Research Projects: 
A research project usually takes 3 months and includes literature research, an experimental plan, experiments or theoretical investigations, as well as a critical discussion of the results. As a rule, the report on the project work should be submitted no later than 4 weeks after completion of the practical work. If this deadline is exceeded, the assessor is no longer obliged to accept the work.

To ensure that all project work takes place under comparable conditions, the detailed guidelines for the project work (Agreement & Guidelines for research projects) must be taken note of before the project work begins. This is confirmed by a signature on the last page of the document. This confirmation (the last page) should be submitted to the Msc Physics of Life student office before the start of the project work.

About Learning Contracts:
The study contract defines the conditions for acquiring credit points for a project thesis (10 CP). The project supervisor guarantees you the necessary supervision and the infrastructure required to carry out the project work.

The project work must be approved before the start of the project with a study contract between the supervisor, your advisor from the Teaching Committee (UK), and you. You enter the data in Services according to the instructions provided.

Necessary details for the Research Project Learning Contract:

• The start date and submission deadline are to be specified in the study contract. (Duration: usually 3 months) 
• As "Learning Format" (Art der Studentischen Leistung), 'Project work' must be chosen from the dropdown menu
• "Credits" are to be 10 CP
• 'pass/fail' must be entered as the "grading format"
• In addition, you need a "Title", which will show up in your transcript of records
• "Content": here you need to fill in a short description
• "Performance review" (form, scope):  here you need to mention: research work, written report on experimental design, experiments or theoretical investigations, as well as critical discussion of the results, and a short oral presentatio. 
• As assessor you chose the a Group Leader of the Faculty of Science who is supervising the project (host PI). The assessor online approves the project beforehand, and evaluates the project work afterwards

To-Do’s before the start of a research project

• Choice of Research Project. Meet with your assigned advisor from the Teaching Committee to discuss your research interest and find a potential supervisor (host PI) for your research projects.
• Contact your potential host PI to discuss the project.
• Activate a "learning contract project work" in Services. The learning contract should be checked by the supervisor and the teaching committee in services.unibas.ch before you start working on the project. You are informed by an automatic email about approval. If you do not receive approval before the start of the project, please remind your supervisor to approve the learning contract in services.unibas.ch ASAP.
• "Agreement for research projects": The agreement is part of the document „Agreement & Guidelines for research projects". The agreement (last page) is to be handed in at the MSc Physics of Life student office.

Downloads

• List of potential supervisors
• Agreement & Guidelines for Research Projects