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Bulletin Archive

This archived information is dated to the 2011-12 academic year only and may no longer be current.

For currently applicable policies and information, see the current Stanford Bulletin.

Engineer in Aeronautics and Astronautics

The degree of Engineer represents an additional year (or more) of study beyond the M.S. degree and includes a research thesis. The program is designed for students who wish to do professional engineering work upon graduation and who want to engage in more specialized study than is afforded by the master's degree alone. It is expected that fulltime students will be able to complete the degree within two years of study after the master's degree.

The University's basic requirements for the degree of Engineer are outlined in the "Graduate Degrees" section of this bulletin. The following are department requirements.

The candidate's prior study program should have fulfilled the department's requirements for the master's degree or a substantial equivalent. Beyond the master's degree, a total of 45 units of work is required, including a thesis and a minimum of 30 units of courses chosen as follows:

  1. 24 units of approved technical electives, of which 9 are in mathematics or applied mathematics. (A list of courses approved for the mathematics requirement is available in the departmental student services office.) The remaining 15 units are chosen in consultation with the adviser, and represent a coherent field of study related to the thesis topic. Suggested fields include: (a) acoustics, (b) aerospace structures, (c) aerospace systems synthesis and design, (d) analytical and experimental methods in solid and fluid mechanics, (e) computational fluid dynamics, and (f) guidance and control.
  2. 6 units of free electives.
  3. The remaining 15 units may be thesis, research, technical courses, or free electives.

Candidates for the degree of Engineer are expected to have a minimum grade point average (GPA) of 3.0 for work in courses beyond those required for the master's degree. All courses except seminars and directed research should be taken for a letter grade.

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