Doctoral Programme in Architecture from the Universitat Internacional de Catalunya
Presentation
- Type of programme
- Ph. Degrees
- Campus
- Campus Barcelona
- Duration
- Full -time: 4 years. Part-time: 7 years
- Places
- 11
- Modality
- Blended learning/Online
Enrollment period
The programme
The aim of the Doctorate in Architecture is to train researchers and specialists capable of responding in their field to the problems existing in our society, promoting the generation of innovative knowledge at the service of society.
To do this, students will acquire training that enables them to generate studies that deepen the knowledge of all dimensions that affect architecture at various levels, as well as the different dynamics of the human and technological systems in which they are involved.
The Doctorate in Architecture program offers a wide range of research lines. These include scales that study landscape and city management; innovative construction systems; content that works in composition, history and architectural heritage; and new subjects in sustainability, cooperation, citizen participation and public health.
This Doctoral Programme in turn aims to respond to currently existing theoretical and methodological challenges, to provide new knowledge that will improve the systems in which architecture is developed from a scientific and ethical perspective. Defending an architecture and an urbanism in which innovation can coexist with different cultures without exclusions, from a humanist perspective in which the sciences and the arts can coexist.
The incorporation of doctoral students into the different research groups is also an objective, in order to specialise and expand the specific contents of each line of research. The existence of specific committees external to the university, during the process of preparing the thesis, guarantees the quality of the research and increases the possibility of creating scientific networks around the thesis, of great help for the doctoral candidate.
The doctoral student of the program acquires a greater depth in the vision of any of the different scales and environments that he chooses from the architectural discipline such as the planning of the landscape and the city, the design of buildings, innovative construction systems, the contents that they work on composition, architectural history and heritage, and new subjects in sustainability and cooperation.
In all these lines, the doctoral student will be able to lead research projects and will specialize in content that will enrich their professional status.
Doctoral School
Academic Accreditation
Doctor o Doctora en Arquitectura por la Universitat Internacional de Catalunya
Everything you need to know about the doctoral candidates and students, the thesis supervision, the duration of the programme and the conditions of the Doctorate.
Structure and planning
Specific doctoral information
In their first year, newly admitted doctoral students must prepare their Personal Training Plan. This must include the mandatory and optional courses, whether organized by the Doctoral School or external, as well as the training activities (participation in conferences, stays, teaching collaborations) that they want to carry out during their doctorate. This Plan will be approved by the CED together with the Research Plan.
For the Architecture program, at the time of submitting the thesis, it is mandatory to have completed three training courses: Ethics of research in social sciences and humanities; Data protection; and Management of bibliographic sources.
It is also mandatory to participate in the seminar presenting the state of research, organized by the Academic Committee of the program, in the third year.
Before the end of the first year, the doctoral student must submit their Research Plan to a committee of experts outside the UIC, the specific doctoral committee (CED), for further approval by the DAC.
The aspects to be considered for the oral presentation and which will be evaluated are as follows:
- To demonstrate the scholarly objective of the research plan: current status, contribution of work in current period, relevance of the topic.
- Present the methodology and the proposed work plan to achieve the project's scholarly objective.
- Show that the project's proposed objectives can be reasonably achieved within the stipulated timeframe.
- Doctoral candidate’s communicative skills.
- The ability to provide a critical and reasoned response to the questions posed by the Committee.
- Present other relevant data during the current period of the research plan: incorporation of the doctoral candidate into a research team (if appropriate).
Development and approval
- The specific committee must evaluate the quality and feasibility of the Research Plan, and it may reject it if it does not seem appropriate.
- Each member of the CED shall evaluate the aspects indicated in the template and, if desired, indicate the optional recommendations, mandatory modifications, or any other comments it may consider in relation to the evaluated research plan.
- At the end, the president of the CED shall fill in the evaluation report
Assessment of your research plan:
- PASS (project and presentation are correct)
- PASS BUT WITH SUGGESTIONS FOR IMPROVEMENT (CED recommends that the doctoral student make some changes that do not substantially affect the research plan, but can improve the thesis project)
- PROJECT WITH compulsory MODIFICATIONS (the project must be reviewed, to incorporate the changes indicated by the CED that modify the research plan presented to a significant extent (objectives, methodology, capacity to carry out...) The doctoral candidate must submit the project again, in writing or in oral presentation to the CED, as directed.
- FAIL (The doctoral candidate will be advised to submit a new project to the CED)
Academic Committee for Doctoral Studies
The Doctoral Academic Committee (CAD) is the body responsible for ensuring the academic quality of the program and doctoral theses, as well as the proper development of the doctoral students’ training process.
The CAD monitors and evaluates students’ academic progress on an annual basis and authorizes key aspects of the doctoral journey, such as thesis supervision, research plan, research stays, or extensions.
It also ensures compliance with current regulations and is responsible for validating the doctoral thesis for its defense before the corresponding examination board.
Doctoral Academic Committee for Architecture
SARRABLO MORENO, Vicenç
President
Department of Architecture
sarrablo@uic.es
BENAGES ALBERT, Marta
Member
Department of Architecture
martabenages@uic.es
LLUÍS GINOVART, Josep
Member
Department of Architecture
jlluis@uic.es
Teaching staff and lines of research
GRC Sustainable Urban Living
Coordinator
Group members
Dra. Carmen Mendoza, Dr. Pere Vall, Dra. Marta Benages, Dr. Lorenzo Chelleri, Dr. Diego Navarro, Dr. Borja Ferrater, Dra. Kathrin Golda-Pongratz, Dra. Apen Ruiz Martinez, Sara Eltokhy, Ashley Howard.
Research sublines
Research subline: Sustainable recovery and displacement
Coordinator: Dra. Carmen Mendoza
This research line addresses the knowledge gap for city planners, policymakers and support agencies related to how to respond to the increasing link between disasters, migration and displacements at an urban scale.
Research subline: Community-based Urbanism
Coordinators: Dr. Pere Vall and Dra. Marta Benages
Using qualitative GIS and social cartography, this research line is oriented to community-based river management (citizen use and perception, citizen-based river groups, citizen science); characterization of environmental volunteering (significant life experiences, motivations, benefits and barriers); and, healthy aging and co-production of green environments
Research subline: Urban and regional resilience toward sustainability
Coordinator: Dr. Lorenzo Chelleri
This research line is framed around the exploration and implementation of the concept of resilience as a set of adaptive and transformative capacities enhancing self-sufficiency and sustainability.
Research and teaching team
- Dra. Carmen Mendoza
- Dr. Pere Vall
- Dra. Marta Benages
- Dr. Lorenzo Chelleri
- Dr. Diego Navarro
- Dr. Borja Ferrater
Invited researchers and collaborators
- Dra. Kathrin Golda-Pongratz
- Dra. Apen Ruiz Martínez
- Ashley Glenn Howard
- Sara Fikry Abdelshafy Eltokhy
- Eloïse Deshayes
- Timea Szőke
Technological Innovation in Industrial and Sustainable Building LAB (LITEIS)
Coordinator
Group members
Dr. Vicenç Sarrablo, Dr. Víctor Echarri, Dr. Juan Trias de Bes, Dr. Felipe Pich-Aguilera, Dr. Josep Lluís Ginovart, Dr. Jordi Roviras, Dr. Pedro Casariego, Dr. Oriol Carrasco, Dr. Íñigo Ugalde, Dr. Ricardo Gómez, Dra. Cinta Lluís, Dra. Alessandra Curreli, Teresa Batlle, Cristina García Castelao, Zuzana Prochazkova.
Research sublines
Research subline: Innovative construction systems with ceramic elements
Coordinator: Dr. Vicenç Sarrablo
In this line, those constructive systems for architectural envelopes that use ceramic products in an innovative way are investigated, both in brick or tile formats, as well as in large-format and small-thickness tiles and sheets.
Research subline: Heritage and factory mechanics. Structural understanding of historic buildings. Sacred heritage and its conditioning of space
Coordinator: Dr. Josep Lluís Ginovart
Deepening of the knowledge of the architectural heritage, from the Romanesque to the beginning of the 20th century, through the massive capture of data with the existing technology at our disposal. Also in this line of research, sacred heritage, its state of conservation, legislative requirements and modes of intervention in it are analyzed.
Research subline: Energy efficiency of buildings and environment
Coordinator: Dr. Víctor Echarri
The objective is to quantify the annual energy demand of buildings based on the constructive solutions of the envelopes, applied passive systems, advanced air conditioning systems, as well as the environmental impacts derived in all phases of the construction, use, reuse and demolition of buildings through Life Cycle Assessment (LCA).
Research subline: Structural Analysis and Design
Coordinator: Dr. Pedro Casariego
Research focuses on the analysis and design of structures in the field of architecture, project engineering and construction and provides structural support in product development in the field of industrial and environmental engineering.
Research subline: Architecture and health
Coordinator: Dr. Jordi Roviras
Analysis of the spaces we inhabit in terms of health and well-being and study of new products or construction systems that provide a clear healthy benefit to the user. The hygroscopic and hydrothermal capacity of materials, indoor air quality, toxic-free materials, acoustic quality and comfort, lighting and electroclimate, among others, are considered.
Research and teaching team
- Dr. Vicenç Sarrablo
- Dr. Víctor Echarri
- Dr. Juan Trias de Bes
- Dr. Felipe Pich-Aguilera
- Dr. Josep Lluís Ginovart
- Dr. Jordi Roviras
- Dr. Pedro Casariego
- Dr. Íñigo Ugalde
- Dr. Oriol Carrasco
- Dra. Cinta Lluís Teruel
- Dr. Ricardo José Gómez Val
Invited researchers and collaborators
- Cristina García Castelao
- Teresa Batlle
- Zuzana Prochazkova
- Dra. Alessandra Curreli
Genetic Architectures (GENARQ)
Coordinator
Members of the group
Dr. Alberto T. Estévez, Dra. Yomna K. Abdallah, Dr. Pablo Baquero, Dra. Magda Bosch, Dr. Dragos Brescan, Karl Chu, Dr. Josep Corcó, Dr. Dennis Dollens, Dr. Gabriel Fernández, Dr. Agustí Fontarnau, Dr. Marcelo Fraile, Dra. Daniela Frogheri, Dra. Effimia Giannopoulou, Dr. Marwan C. Halabi, Dr. Aref Maksoud, Dr. Abel Miró, Affonso Orciuoli, Dra. Lamila Simisic, Dr. Angad Warang, Ignasi Pérez Arnal.
Research sublines
Research subline 1: BioDigital Architecture (& Theory)
Coordinators: Dr. Alberto T. Estévez i Dr. Josep Corcó
Together with its corresponding Master in Biodigital Architecture, this line of research addresses the application of genetics to architecture in an interdisciplinary way from two points of view: the real, natural and biological, worked with geneticists, and the metaphorical, artificial and digital, that uses CAD-CAM and AI technologies. Biological and digital morphogenesis, digital organicism, emergence, metaphysics and computation, artificial intelligence, complexity, sustainability, are his keywords.
Research subline 2: Biological Architecture (& Digital)
Coordinators: Dr. Alberto T. Estévez i Dra. Yomna K. Abdallah
Introduction of biological techniques in architecture and design with digital tools to achieve a biodigital fusion, understanding the potential of bio-learning, bio-manufacturing and genetics. With this, the world's first genetic architecture laboratory was created in 2000, where genetics began to be applied to architecture and design (bioluminescent trees, biolamps, bioprinting, SEM research on structures, biomaterials, etc.).
Research subline 3: Digital Architecture (& Biology)
Coordinators: Dr. Alberto T. Estévez i Dr. Angad Warang
In a pioneering, international and interdisciplinary environment, widely demonstrated for more than two decades, since the year 2000, when the first digital architecture laboratory in Spain was set up, mention should be made specifically of architecture and computing research and teaching from concepts such as Intelligence Artificial (AI), Ambient Intelligence (AmI), Deep Learning (DL), Evolutionary Computation (EC), Logistic Regression (LR), Machine Learning (ML), Multi-Agent Systems (MAS), Shape Grammars (SG), among others.
Research subline 4: Architectural Composition (& Projects)
Coordinators: Dr. Alberto T. Estévez i Dra. Judith Urbano
This line of research is the oldest at the UIC Barcelona, founded in 1998 by Professor of Architectural Composition Dr. Alberto T. Estévez, and includes possible research on architectural composition and architectural projects, theory and history of architecture and design.
Research and teaching team
- Dr. Alberto T. Estévez
- Dra. Yomna K. Abdallah
- Dra. Magda Bosch
- Dr. Josep Corcó
- Dr. Gabriel Fernández
- Dra. Judith Urbano
Invited researchers and collaborators
- Dr. Dragos Brescan
- Dr. Pablo Baquero
- Karl Chu
- Dr. Dennis Dollens
- Dr. Agustí Fontarnau
- Dr. Marcelo Fraile
- Dra. Daniela Frogheri
- Dra. Effimia Giannopoulou
- Dr. Marwan C. Halabi
- Dr. Aref Maksoud
- Dr. Abel Miró
- Affonso Orciuoli
- Dra. Lamila Simisic
- Dr. Angad Warang
- Ignasi Pérez Arnal
Access and admissions process
Admission procedure for doctoral studies
Everything you need to know about the procedure for general admission, the documentation for admission and the general academic requirements.
STEP 1 . Once the pre-registration period is open, the interested person must complete the online registration for the doctoral program from the web link to the application.
STEP 2. In order to carry out the pre-registration process, you must have the following mandatory documentation at hand:
- Photocopy of the DNI/NIF/NIE/passport.
- Updated Curriculum vitae.
- Photocopy of the respective documents that certify the fulfillment of the academic requirements according to the previous studies that grant you access to the Doctorate: Degree and master's title and academic transcript with the average grade. (For other access paths, Consult the Previous Studies and Documentation Guide).
- Research Proposal
- Motivation letter (according to template)
- Letter of support from the director (according to template)
In the event of proposing a director from outside UIC Barcelona, their CV must necessarily be attached, reflecting their adequacy to carry out the supervision tasks, that is: number of doctoral theses they have directed and, if applicable, the number of recognized six-year research terms.
STEP 3. The candidate is advised to contact their possible thesis director or the person in charge of the line of research of interest to carry out a pre-screening interview before presenting all the documentation. (In order to complete the pre-registration process in the application, the letter of support from the director must be attached together with the rest of the required documentation, according to the template).
STEP 4. The Secretary of the Doctoral School will check that the candidate meets the academic requirements for access to doctoral studies and that the requested documentation is complete and correct.
STEP 5. The Doctoral Academic Committee will assess the number of applications received in relation to the number of new access places available in the program and will decide whether or not to admit the candidate, taking into account the admission profile and the admission criteria specified in each program.
STEP 6. Finally, the Doctoral School will inform the candidate whether or not they have been admitted to the Program, and if applicable, they will be informed of the corresponding procedures to enroll in the doctorate.
Entry profile and criteria for admission to a doctorate in Architecture
A) The recommended profile for doctoral students is as follows:
- To be in possession of a degree (bachelor’s or master’s degree) related to the scope of Architecture at all its conceptual and scalar levels, namely: Architecture, Urbanism, Engineering (which leads to a connection with the field of Construction and Structures), Design, Fine Arts, Art History (which leads to a connection with the field of History of Architecture), Philosophy (which leads to a connection with the field of Aesthetics), etc., or other related fields that include subjects related to Architecture research and the disciplines related to it.
- Previous experience in undertaking a research project.
- A vocation for the arts, techniques and/or research.
- Language level.
b) Admission criteria, Candidates will be selected based on the following weightings:
- CV and previous research experience: 40%
- Line of research and related previous knowledge: 30%
- Interview and motivation: 20%
- Language level: 10%
Prices, grants and financial aid
Price
Rights to deposit, read and defend the doctoral thesis: €2,490
Application for the title of Doctor: €350
Enrolment onto the Doctoral Programme
The student must annually enrol on the programme and can only enrol for one of our approved doctoral programmes. There is no option to enrol in another programme simultaneously.
Annual enrolment for each academic year
- Doctoral students shall annually formalise doctoral enrolment corresponding to thesis supervision, training activities and annual evaluation by the Academic Doctoral Committee.
Registration at the time of deposit and thesis defence
- At the end of the thesis, they must formalise the registration of the deposit and the defence of the thesis.
- Once the thesis has been defended, the administrative fees for applying for the doctoral degree must be paid.
Financial Information for academic year 2026-2027
Annual registration fee for the program: €98
- Academic fees: €900
- Administrative fees: €98
Rights to deposit, read and defend the doctoral thesis: €2,490
- Academic fees: €1,810
- Administrative fees: €680
Application for the title of Doctor:
- Administrative fees: €350
Grants and financial aid
The UIC Vice-rector for Research offers predoctoral contracts for doctoral studies. There are also several different grants awarded by different public and private institutions to carry out doctoral studies.
Defended doctoral theses
Deposit and reading procedure
Defended doctoral theses
FAQ
General regulations
