Doctoral School Competition

The Astronomy and Astrophysics Doctoral School receives about 20 full doctoral contracts (2200 euros gross salary per month for 3 years) from its different universities. These contracts are awarded through a joint competition that takes place every spring.

Calendar of the 2026 competition

• Applications must be submitted by April 17th 2026, 23h59 CEST.
• Applications will be examined by the jury during the first half of May. Selection will be based on academic results, suitability of the training for the thesis subject, letters of recommendation.
• The selected candidates will be invited to an audition which will take place on the first week of June 2026.
• All contracts will be awarded by the final jury on June 8th 2026.
• The Doctoral School Board will validate the results before they are published on line.
• The selected candidates have one week to accept or refuse the contract offered to them

Application

Applications must be submitted on the Doctoral School website (application) between February 1st and April 17th, 2026.

Interview

The interview duration is 20 minutes. A 12-minute presentation should outline previous research experiences (their scientific objectives, methodologies used and results obtained) and should show that the candidate understands the issues at stake in the proposed topic and how they are able to make a significant contribution to it. Typically, the candidate will spend 2 minutes introducing him/herself, 5 minutes describing his/her research experiences (mainly the M2 internship) and 5 minutes on the thesis topic and its issues.

The presentation will be followed by 8 minutes of questions.

The interviews will take place via Zoom only.

Jury

On June 8th, the jury will award all available contracts and will constitute a waiting list, the ranking of which is not disclosed. Selected candidates are asked to respond to this proposal within a week to allow for the proper management of withdrawals.