lut master thesis guidelines

• Suomeksi (FI)
• In English (EN)

Master's thesis

Master's thesis is the final work for Master's degree in which the student will benefit widely the skills and knowledge acquired in the Master's studies in order to solve a specific challenge. Master's thesis is one of the strongest ways to transfer to the working life after graduation.

Every year about 800 Master's thesis are done at LUT University. Most of them are commissioned by companies or other organizations.

Why to commission a Master's thesis?

For companies and other organizations the Master's thesis offers a possibility to

• get wider challenges or tasks done through student work
• get access to new information and apply theory to practical challenge and
• get to know a potential future employee and recruit him/her.

What kind of topic is suitable for a Master's thesis?

Wider design, development or research topics are suitable for Master's thesis. The variety of topics is wide. However, the topic needs to be directly linked to the content of the Master's programme. Check the previous Master's thesis at LUT University at LUT Pub system.

The length of a Master's thesis is about 80-100 pages and the time reserved for it is about 6 months of work. Masters's thesis are almost without exceptions done as individual work.

The students will start their Master's thesis projects according to their own schedules all around the year. However, the strongest need for Master's thesis topics is in the beginning of the autumn and spring semesters as well as at the end of spring semester.

LUT University recommends that the student will get paid for the Master's thesis project. This can happen either by employing the student for a work relationship or giving him/her a grant for the thesis project.

You can check the salary recommendations by employee unions and grant procedures below.

• TEK salary recommendations
• Suomen Ekonomit pay recommendations
• Grant through Research Foundation

LUT Career Spark subsidy covers part of the wage costs when employer offers an international student a paid Master's thesis position with employment relationship.

Other oblications

The company or other organization should

• offer a topic suitable for the thesis and be willing to define the topic in more detail
• actively participate in supervising the thesis project for the whole duration of the project and
• read the final Master's thesis and give comments to it.

Naturally, the student will also need an access to all the information and material needed from the company's / organization's side to execute the thesis project.

Masters's thesis always has a designated supervisor from LUT University.

Finding a student

You can publish your Master's thesis positions to our students in an electric JobTeaser job portal. We will publish all Master's thesis positions suitable for our study fields regardless of the salary level.

Note that the students will select the Master's thesis position which interests them and at the time that suits their studies. Therefore, all offered Master's thesis projects will not be carried out. We recommend that you will pay attention to the attractiveness of your Master's thesis position, the flexibility of its schedule and the way you present it to the students. Unpaid Master's thesis positions will be applied quite rarely.

The final topic of the Master's thesis will always be defined in a meeting together with the company / organization, student and the supervising professor.

Master's thesis reports are public documents and they will be published at LUTPub database.

If required, an embargo can be set for the report for max. 2 years. After that the report will be published.

If the student makes the Master's thesis in a work relationship, the employer and the student will sign a normal contract of employment together.

In all other cases, a separate agreement will not be signed. However, the employer may agree about the confidentiality of the information directly with the student.

The professor supervising and evaluating the Master's thesis is bound by the confidentiality obligation of the work agreement. Therefore, the teachers will not sign any separate confidentiality agreements.

If the Master's thesis is done in a work relationship, the employer is responsible for providing necessary insurances for the student.

For Master's thesis projects without a work relationship, LUT University students are covered with Worker's Compensation Insurance . Liability insurance is not provided by LUT University.

Contact persons

If you need some assistance in evaluating or defining your thesis idea, please contact:

• Business Administration: Hanna Salojärvi
• Chemical Engineering: Ritva Tuunila
• Computational Engineering: Lassi Roininen
• Electrical Engineering: Katja Hynynen
• Energy Technology: Päivi Sikiö
• Environmental Technology: Sanni Väisänen
• Indutrial Engineering and Management: Petra Pekkanen
• Mechanical Engineering: Harri Eskelinen
• Software Engineering: Jussi Kasurinen
• Social Sciences: Hanna-Mari Husu

Advertise a Master's thesis postition

LUTPub Publication Repository: BSc and MSc theses checklist

• BSc and MSc theses checklist
• Request to modify Thesis - change pdf for submission
• Submit your publication or other item to LUTPub

Pay attention to these before submitting your BSc or MSc thesis to LUTPub

The LUT Academic Library makes a publication review to the thesis you save in LUTPub within three working days . If necessary, we ask you to make modifications to your thesis and advice you how to replace your existing submission with a new pdf. Our possible contact will come to your LUT student email address.

This page contains things that we hope you check before you save your thesis to LUTPub. NOTE! If you are not an international student, please see check list from page written in Finnish .

1. Make a submission only after you have received the permission for publication from the 1st examiner of your thesis.

2. The thesis must be fully completed in all respects before submitting it to LUTPub.

• The name of the university is correct on the title page and in the abstract: Lappeenranta-Lahti University of Technology LUT. In the LUT thesis template the name is right.
• The title of the thesis is the same on the title page and in the abstract.
• Paragraph and page numbering in the table of contents proceed without interruptions.
• Page numbering is visible in pdf.
• You follow the same citation style throughout the thesis.
• Citations in the Harvard style reference list are in alphabetical order.
• Appendices have headings Appendix 1, Appendix 2, etc., and numbering proceeds without gaps.
• Page numbering of attachments follows the instructions of the thesis template.
• Table of contents corresponds to any attachments or lack of them.
• The thesis is a public document by law (Act on the Openness of Government Activities): the version to be published in LUTPub may not mention any attachments that cannot be found in the pdf, i.e. no appendix may be marked as secret, remaining only available to the commissioner , etc.
• For your own data privacy , the thesis may not contain your student number or any personal contact information, and there should not be a signature on the optional Acknowledgements page.

3. Make an accessible pdf of your thesis, pdf/a is the suggested format, and check the file well before submitting it to LUTPub.

• Check carefully the pdf. Sometimes save as pdf puts the layouts in disorder or empty pages appear. Check also that page numbering stays visible.
• Only pdf files are published in LUTPub.

Tip: let a friend read through your thesis pdf before you submit it to LUTPub. He/she might spot something you don't notice.

NOTE! If you submit a wrong version of your thesis to LUTPub, please email us at [email protected] without delay.

Instructions and thesis templates :

You can find instruction links about thesis on eLUT's websites:

• for bachelor’s thesis and for master’s thesis
• for graduation issues
• graduation schedule of master’s degree is available below title Submitting a graduation request for a Master's degree in section Schedule.

All BS c and MSc thesis projects that start after 11 August 2021 follow the positioning and guidance of LUT thesis template. Both Word and LaTeX writing templates are available. The templates are updated when needed. The latest version can be found on eLUT - always get the template there.

• Template for BSc thesis https://elut.lut.fi/en/completing-studies/theses/bachelors-thesis  
• Template for MSc thesis https://elut.lut.fi/en/completing-studies/theses/masters-thesis
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• URL: https://libguides.lut.fi/lutpub-en

LUT Thesis Template

LaTeX template for LUT University's master's and bachelor's theses. The thesis template is created based on the LUT university's official Word template available at: https://elut.lut.fi/en/completing-studies/theses/masters-thesis .

Good luck with the thesis!

License: Creative Commons CC 4.0 (not BY)

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The Bachelor’s thesis is the final thesis of the Bachelor’s degree and is included  in intermediate  specialisation  studies.  The  teacher  of  the  thesis  seminar  or  another  person assigned  by  the  head  of  the  degree  programme  is the  supervisor  of  the  thesis.  During the thesis project, the supervisor provides students with the possibility to present the progress of their  thesis  and  receive  feedback.  The  supervisor  may  also  request  a progress report from the student. Bachelor’s theses are public documents.

Degree programmes may issue specific guidelines for the thesis, taking into account e.g. the partner university's thesis requirements for double degree programmes.

Some degree programs use bachelor's thesis forms. Please find links below (use only the forms on this page - for example, forms found through search engines may not be up to date):

• School of Energy Systems LES: Application for Bachelor's Thesis Topic

In other degree programs, the thesis process does not require the use of similar forms.

Commissioned thesis

If you do your thesis in cooperation with an external party, for example a company, please provide your commissioner with an information packet on the bachelor's thesis. It opens up the specific features of the Bachelor's thesis:  Information to the commissioner of a Bachelor's Thesis .

• Thesis template - Word
• Thesis template – LaTeX  (for LaTeX users)

Guidelines for writing a Bachelor's thesis

The Bachelor’s thesis is the final thesis for the Bachelor's degree. The Bachelor’s thesis and related seminar are part of the compulsory intermediate studies of a student’s specialisation field. It requires students to apply their knowledge and skills to solve a research problem related to their field of study. The work requires an active and independent approach from students. The student bears the responsibility for the work, its progress and conclusion.

Students start the project by signing up for the thesis course or seminar according to their degree programme’s instructions. Degree programmes may issue their own, more detailed instructions to complement the university's guidelines and publish them in the eLUT student website or Moodle.

After completing the thesis, students will

• be familiar with the basic concepts and methods of scientific research
• be able to organise their own work and set their own goals and schedules
• be able to search for, critically evaluate, utilise and interpret sources
• define a research problem
• report on their research according to scientific practice and the practices of their own field.

The supervisor of the Bachelor’s thesis supports the student in independent work, scientific thinking and the development of research skills. The supervisor lets students present the progress of their work and gives feedback on it.

The supervisor is also the examiner who assesses the Bachelor’s thesis. The head of the degree programme may also appoint another teacher from the degree programme as the examiner. The examiner must have a Master’s degree.

The university expects students to know and observe the ethical principles of academic studies and therefore instructs students in following good scientific practice.

Plagiarism is strictly forbidden. Citations and references must be made in accordance with established scientific practice. If the degree programme or examiner require nothing else, the thesis should employ the author-date referencing style – also known as Harvard referencing. If regardless of the supervisor’s instruction the thesis contains plagiarised material, the thesis will receive a failing grade. Moreover, the matter will be brought to the rector's attention.

Supervisors employ the Turnitin software to verify the originality of the text, give feedback and guide the student. The university requires that final theses be checked with Turnitin before grading. Further information on Turnitin and originality verification is available Turnitin -page.

For additional information on the responsible conduct of research, see the LUT Code of Conduct .

Students may write their Bachelor’s thesis in Finnish, Swedish or English. The section below regarding the abstract gives instructions on the language of the maturity test.

The thesis typically includes the following parts in the following order:

• table of contents
• list of symbols and abbreviations
• introduction
• discussion/processing
• conclusions
• appendices.

The degree programmes or schools issue more detailed instructions on the formalities and writing of theses for their fields of study. However, all title pages and abstracts must be formulated as follows:

The title page contains the following information:

Lappeenranta - Lahti University of Technology LUT Degree programme Name of author Title of thesis Bachelor’s thesis and year Supervisor 

On the title page, write the information above as follows (example): LUT School of Energy  Systems; NOT Name of school: LUT School of Energy Systems

Abstract/maturity test

Students include an abstract in their work. It is also the maturity test for the degree. The examiner of the thesis assesses the maturity test along with the entire thesis.

The abstract should start with the following information:

• type of document (abstract)
• title of thesis
• name of author
• name of school (LUT Business School / LUT School of Energy Systems /LUT School of Engineering Sciences)
• degree programme
• supervisor of thesis.

The abstract is a public document.

Students who have received their compulsory education in Finland in either Finnish or Swedish write their maturity test in the language of their compulsory education. The examiner reviews the maturity test to verify the student’s knowledge of the field of study and the clarity of the language. The language will not be separately assessed by a language expert unless the thesis supervisor so requires for a special reason. The examiner gives the maturity test and its content (K1) and the language (K2) either a passing or a failing grade. In addition to the abstract in Finnish or Swedish, the degree programme may require an English abstract in the Bachelor's thesis.

Students who have received their compulsory education abroad or in a language other than Finnish or Swedish in Finland write an abstract in English as their maturity test. In such cases, the maturity test is given a passing or failing grade only in terms of the content (K1). Although examiners do not grade the language, the abstract must be clear and coherent.

More detailed instructions are available in the Maturity test -page.

Thesis template

A thesis template produced for LUT students guides in Bachelor’s thesis writing. Template is available in the beginning of this page.

The Bachelor's thesis is a public-access final thesis. Students publish their finished work by uploading it and its abstract(s) into the LUTPub database administrated by the LUT Academic Library. 

The Bachelor’s thesis is evaluated on the scale excellent (5), very good (4), good (3), satisfactory (2), passable (1) and failed (0). Students may not rewrite an approved Bachelor's thesis.

Schools define their own assessment criteria for Bachelor’s theses. The criteria may include e.g.

• the problem-setting, objectives, definitions and delimitations of the thesis
• the relationship to previous research
• the research approach, methods and material used in the work
• the schedule of the research and time management
• the results and their analysis
• the organisation and coherence of the work
• the profoundness of the work
• the reliability of the work
• the language and layout of the work
• an independent approach and application. 

Students dissatisfied with their grade may request a correction to the grade within 14 days of having received knowledge of it. The request is made in writing, addressed to the university's degree board and submitted to Records Services.

• pages for students writing a thesis  
• LibGuides , a portal with instructions and information provided by the library  

Ethical guidelines for students

Turnitin guides

• for students
• for supervisors