New Frontiers of Electronic Theses and Dissertations

(1) Background: Since the 1990s, theses and dissertations—a key part of scientific communication—have evolved significantly with advances in information and communication technologies. (2) Methods: This study reviews 99 publications examining these changes, drawing insights from international confer...

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Main Authors: Joachim Schöpfel, Michael Boock, Behrooz Rasuli, Brenda van Wyk
Format: Article
Language:English
Published: MDPI AG 2025-01-01
Series:Encyclopedia
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Online Access:https://www.mdpi.com/2673-8392/5/1/6
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author Joachim Schöpfel
Michael Boock
Behrooz Rasuli
Brenda van Wyk
author_facet Joachim Schöpfel
Michael Boock
Behrooz Rasuli
Brenda van Wyk
author_sort Joachim Schöpfel
collection DOAJ
description (1) Background: Since the 1990s, theses and dissertations—a key part of scientific communication—have evolved significantly with advances in information and communication technologies. (2) Methods: This study reviews 99 publications examining these changes, drawing insights from international conferences and empirical studies in the field. (3) Results: Historically, a major challenge in managing PhD theses has been the shift to electronic formats, resulting in the creation of electronic theses and dissertations (ETDs). This shift involves four main tasks: adopting new digital formats, updating institutional workflows between departments, graduate schools, and academic libraries, implementing updated bibliographic standards (such as metadata and identifiers), and utilizing new tools and channels for distribution. With open science becoming a widespread research policy across many countries and institutions, ensuring open access for ETDs is an added challenge—though a substantial portion of ETD content remains restricted to institutional or library networks. Today, ETD management is on the brink of a new era, with advancements in data-driven science and artificial intelligence. (4) Conclusions: The development of ETDs varies significantly across different countries, regions, and institutions due to technological, organizational, and legal differences. It is essential for academic libraries and other stakeholders to address the challenges identified while considering these variations.
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spelling doaj-art-35f2d28fad1748fcb6b6a566cc273b0a2025-08-20T02:42:41ZengMDPI AGEncyclopedia2673-83922025-01-0151610.3390/encyclopedia5010006New Frontiers of Electronic Theses and DissertationsJoachim Schöpfel0Michael Boock1Behrooz Rasuli2Brenda van Wyk3Department of Information and Document Sciences, University of Lille, 59000 Lille, FranceLibraries, Oregon State University, Corvallis, OR 97331, USAIranian Research Institute for Information Science and Technology (IranDoc), Tehran 1314156545, IranDepartment of Information Science, The University of Pretoria, Pretoria 0002, South Africa(1) Background: Since the 1990s, theses and dissertations—a key part of scientific communication—have evolved significantly with advances in information and communication technologies. (2) Methods: This study reviews 99 publications examining these changes, drawing insights from international conferences and empirical studies in the field. (3) Results: Historically, a major challenge in managing PhD theses has been the shift to electronic formats, resulting in the creation of electronic theses and dissertations (ETDs). This shift involves four main tasks: adopting new digital formats, updating institutional workflows between departments, graduate schools, and academic libraries, implementing updated bibliographic standards (such as metadata and identifiers), and utilizing new tools and channels for distribution. With open science becoming a widespread research policy across many countries and institutions, ensuring open access for ETDs is an added challenge—though a substantial portion of ETD content remains restricted to institutional or library networks. Today, ETD management is on the brink of a new era, with advancements in data-driven science and artificial intelligence. (4) Conclusions: The development of ETDs varies significantly across different countries, regions, and institutions due to technological, organizational, and legal differences. It is essential for academic libraries and other stakeholders to address the challenges identified while considering these variations.https://www.mdpi.com/2673-8392/5/1/6electronic theses and dissertationsdigitizationopen accessinstitutional repositoriesresearch datametadata
spellingShingle Joachim Schöpfel
Michael Boock
Behrooz Rasuli
Brenda van Wyk
New Frontiers of Electronic Theses and Dissertations
Encyclopedia
electronic theses and dissertations
digitization
open access
institutional repositories
research data
metadata
title New Frontiers of Electronic Theses and Dissertations
title_full New Frontiers of Electronic Theses and Dissertations
title_fullStr New Frontiers of Electronic Theses and Dissertations
title_full_unstemmed New Frontiers of Electronic Theses and Dissertations
title_short New Frontiers of Electronic Theses and Dissertations
title_sort new frontiers of electronic theses and dissertations
topic electronic theses and dissertations
digitization
open access
institutional repositories
research data
metadata
url https://www.mdpi.com/2673-8392/5/1/6
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