Doctoral training centres and partnerships
Doctoral training centres and partnerships are four-year programmes that are sponsored by one of the UK’s research councils. They focus on your development into an independent researcher, under the guidance of an expert supervision team.
They may be referred to as Doctoral Training Partnerships (DTPs), Doctoral Training Centres (DTCs) or Centres for Doctoral Training (CDTs).
Positions are often advertised as specific, funded PhD degrees with integrated transferable skills training programmes.
Doctoral Training Centres and support available
Programme structure
Some programmes are structured as 1+3 - a 1-year MScR + 3-year PhD. Others are structured as a 4-year PhD with integrated training, in which courses are taken alongside PhD research. The exact structure varies by programme.
Some DTPs, DTCs and CDTs offer industrial internships or training opportunities to ensure that your research is informed by real world case studies. You should check the content and structure of the doctoral training programme you are interested in for specific details.
A-Z of all research programmes