On Thursday 5 July, the 16,000th doctoral thesis defence ceremony will take place at the University of Amsterdam (UvA). Thomas de Haan will obtain his doctorate under Prof. Theo Offerman of the Faculty of Economics and Business. The first private doctoral thesis defence ceremony at the UvA was held on 12 July 1878, which saw Diederik Johannes Korteweg - one of the authors of the Korteweg-de Vries Equation – obtain his doctorate in Mathematics and Physics under Prof. Johannes Diederik van der Waals (Nobel Prize winner in 1910).

Since 1891, doctoral thesis defence ceremonies have been held in the Aula of the University. This was initially located at the Oudemanhuispoort, but was moved to its present location at the Singel in the sixties. Since 2007, many PhD ceremonies have taken place in the renovated Agnietenkapel, the home of the UvA’s predecessor, the Athenaeum Illustre, which was established in 1632.

The thesis of De Haan is titled Strategic Communication Theory and Experiment. The ceremony will take place in the Agnietenkapel from 16:00. See link below for more information.