Top Master Programme in Nanoscience

The Zernike Institute for Advanced Materials is responsible for the Top Master Programme in Nanoscience. This is a two-year international English-language Master's degree programme, open to excellent students with a Bachelor's degree in physics, chemistry or materials science. After the initial phase, our aim is to admit 20 students per year, 50% of them from abroad. 

Students are pre-selected on the basis of academic potential and excellent results in their Bachelor's phase, supported by a letter of application explaining their motivation, a list of accomplishments, and letters of recommendation. Pre-selected students will normally be invited for an interview in Groningen. All accepted students will receive fellowships, conditional on their making sufficient progress.

The Zernike Institute will try to find for all students who complete the programme a PhD position at the Zernike Institute for Advanced Materials.  A PhD in The Netherlands normally takes four years, after the Master degree has been obtained. For exceptionally gifted students, it may be possible to combine the second year of the Top Master Programme with the first year of the PhD Programme, leading to a MSc/PhD-programme of five instead of six years duration. 

The Zernike Institute for Advanced Materials is responsible for organizing the curriculum of the Top Master Programme in Nanoscience.  The Scientific Director of the Zernike Institute for Advanced Materials is also the Academic Director of the Programme.  To guarantee a solid anchor in the related educational institutes, the Director of the Educational Institute of Science and Technology is a board member of the Top Master Programme, as is one of the current students of the Programme.

The Top Master Programme in Nanoscience aims at an interdisciplinary training in modern materials science, with a focus on nanoscale phenomena. Teachers and supervisors associated with the programme represent the excellent research groups taking part in the research programme of the Zernike Institute for Advanced Materials.  Students are submitted to a challenging and highly demanding curriculum, combining both the broadness and depth necessary for a successful research career in modern materials science.

Upon successful completion of the Top Master Programme in Nanoscience, the student will be in an excellent position for a career in research in nanoscience and nanotechnology.

 

On 19 March 2008, the Dutch-Flemish Accreditation Organisation (NVAO) decided to extend the accreditation of the Top Master Programme in Nanoscience until 31 December 2013. Furthermore, on 5 August 2008, NVAO has decided to award the special label exceptional quality to seven aspects of this Programme: the intake and admission requirements, sufficient capacity of staff, sufficient accommodation and material facilities, adequate student support and guidance, involvement of stakeholders, realization of intended final qualifications, success rates in line with targets. 

This is the first time NVAO has awarded such a distinction to a Master Programme.

A leaflet (in PDF-format) describing the programme is available here [PDF].