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Bachelor and Master Theses

Welcome to the thesis portal of the Chair of Earth Observation for Ecosystem Management! In the following we list currently available topics for Bachelor and Master theses. If you are interested in a topic or thesis, please contact the owner of the topic (found within the links below). While the theses below are listed in english, some of them can be completed in german. Please reach out to each owner individually, to ask. Below you will also find instructions on how to write your thesis at our professorship. Finally, you will find a list of completed theses for additional inspiration.

Available Topics (as of Summer Semester 2025)

Bachelor

Bachelor Thesis: Do protected areas prevent forest disturbance in Siberia?

Master

The path to a successful thesis

What are the goals of a thesis?

The thesis is part of your curriculum. With it, you demonstrate that you are able to work on a scientific question under the guidance of your supervisor using clearly defined methods and to communicate the results in a scientifically sound manner. The thesis should deal with a scientifically relevant topic, but also a topic that interests *you* personally, because you will be investing a lot of time in the work!

Procedure of the thesis

The process of a thesis can be summarized as follows:

find a topic and supervisor
determine research question
write an exposé
register the thesis
carry out the thesis
writing the thesis
incorporate feedback
submission

The individual steps are described in more detail below.

Research question

Defining the research question is one of the most important parts of the process, as it determines what will (and will not) be investigated in your thesis. This is a process that should be carried out in close collaboration with your supervisor. The research questions should be clearly defined. They should also be formulated in such a way that you can answer them in your thesis using scientific methods. “How can forests be saved from climate change?” is therefore not a good research question, because answering this question would far exceed the time and resources you have available for your work. Choose your questions carefully, because they will determine the methodology you need to answer them!

Exposé

After you have agreed the research question with your supervisor, you should write a short synopsis of your thesis. This should contain four things:

A brief explanation of the motivation for your work, why is it important, why should the research question(s) be answered? This should be justified with current literature.
An overview of the current state of knowledge and the current literature.
Clearly formulated research questions (see above) and corresponding hypotheses. A hypothesis is a testable statement that can potentially be falsified by the analyses you are planning.
The methods you intend to use to answer these questions. Briefly describe how you intend to achieve your goal.

The synopsis should be rather short. Some aspects, such as the methods, can be written in bullet points and do not need to be fully formulated. Research questions and hypotheses, on the other hand, must be clearly set out, as they determine all the steps in your work. An exposé can also include a brief timeline of how you envision the progress of your work (e.g. in the form of a Gantt chart). A typical synopsis is about 2-4 pages long. These pages form the basis of your final thesis. You should only begin with the actual research work once the synopsis has been commented on by your supervisor. Please note that it does not make sense (and does not correspond to the scientific process) to first collect data and then search around in the data until you find a result. You must first have a question/hypothesis and then collect/analyze the data to answer the question!

Registration

Once the synopsis is ready and has been agreed with your supervisor, your thesis can be officially registered with the Admissions Office. Please note that this step marks the beginning of the official period for completing your thesis (Bachelor 3 months and Master 6 months). The registration is done online: webportale.ls.tum.de/thesis/. Please also note that you should register * before* the majority of your work is completed. An official registration of the thesis a few weeks before the submission of the final version would be far too late!

Execution of the thesis

This is the main part of your thesis and may involve collecting and analyzing new data (e.g. field recording), analyzing existing data (e.g. remote sensing data) or analyzing literature, depending on the research question(s). As a rough guide, typical fieldwork is 1-3 weeks for Bachelor's theses and 2-4 weeks for Master's theses (however, this may vary depending on the research question, so talk to your supervisor). Before you go into the field, make sure that you have received the relevant safety instructions and have signed the relevant forms. Your supervisor will provide you with the tools and equipment required for the fieldwork. In terms of planning, keep in mind that data collection is usually only a small part of the work and that you will need plenty of time to analyze your data and write your paper. So plan your fieldwork and/or data collection so that you have enough time for analysis and writing! As a rule, it makes sense to at least have a discussion with your supervisor once the initial results of the analyses are available. In other words, do not start writing down the results until you have received initial feedback on your results, as he/she may have some comments on your analyses and ideas for additional evaluations of the data. Please note that all data you have received from us for your thesis is strictly confidential (unless otherwise agreed), so you should not share it during or after your thesis. If you need a laptop for your analyses, you can rent one here. Please also note that there is no insurance cover from the university if you are outside TUM (e.g. in the field) to write your thesis.

Writing

Writing can be done in different ways, e.g. linear (starting with the first sentence of the paper and ending with the last sentence) or non-linear (starting e.g. with the research questions and hypotheses section, then the methods and results and finally introduction and discussion). Choose the writing style that suits you best and corresponds best with your time schedule (e.g. if you have to wait for additional data or feedback from your supervisor, you can use the time by already researching literature for the introduction or by writing the methods section). Papers can be written in both German and English - you should discuss the advantages and disadvantages with your supervisor and make a joint decision before you start writing. Keep the writing style scientific, i.e. avoid judgmental statements as well as personal and/or emotional formulations. Please also note that the main purpose of your text is to communicate your results and how you arrived at these results, so formulate the text as clearly as possible (so that readers can understand it and reproduce your methodology if necessary). As a rule, theses follow a standardized structure:

Introduction: describe why the topic of your research is relevant and important.
Questions and hypotheses: Describe your research questions and the hypotheses you intend to test
State of knowledge: Describe what is already known about the topic of the study (in relation to the research questions).
Methods and material: Describe which methods you have used in your analyses and which material you have included. Please note that the description should be such that others can reproduce your work based on your writing!
Results: Describe your results; it is often useful to structure the results section along the lines of the research questions posed. The section should present the results of your analyses, but should not contain an interpretation of your results. In science, we make a clear distinction between the results and their interpretation, as other researchers may be interested in your results but may interpret them differently (depending on context, background, etc.).
Discussion: Put the results into context; do your results agree or disagree with other findings (e.g. by other researchers) on the topic? What are the limitations of your work, what should further research focus on? What are the implications of your work, e.g. in the context of forest management? In the discussion section, your results can and should be interpreted.
Conclusions: A short and concise section that summarizes the most important statements about the research question, methods, results and conclusions of your work.

Once all questions regarding the analysis have been clarified, write your thesis to the best of your knowledge and only then send it to your supervisor for review of your draft (see next section). You can find a template for the title page here. Please note that the length of the text is not a good indicator of the quality of the thesis; in other words, the quality of the analyses and the text are more important than the length of the text! As a guide, a typical Bachelor's thesis is 25 to 50 pages (approx. 5000 - 7000 words), a typical Master's thesis is 40 to 100 pages (approx. 6000 - 12000 words).

Feedback

Receiving and incorporating comments from others is an important element of research. For your thesis, you will receive comments on the first complete draft from your supervisor. Please note that we also have many other things to do - so allow some time for feedback (usually 14 days, but it may take longer depending on fieldwork, vacations, etc.). Ideally, you should let your supervisor know well in advance when you want to submit the first complete draft so that he/she can take this into account in his/her schedule. Your supervisor will give you suggestions on how to improve your work. Taking these comments into account is an important part of the work process and should be taken seriously. Please note that this also takes some time, so please plan it into your schedule!

Submission

Once you have incorporated all your supervisor's comments and checked all the necessary details (page breaks, numbering of figures and tables, correct references, etc.), you can submit your work. Congratulations, you've done it! To complete the process, you need to do three things

Hand in your thesis at the campus office (this is the official part of the submission), see https://www.thesis.wzw.tum.de/
Hand over all data and, if applicable, codes to your supervisor (these will be stored on our servers for further use)
Submission of at least one printed copy of the thesis, as well as the signed affidavit of authorship (the affidavit can be part of the thesis or an extra sheet). Whether additional printed copies are desired depends on the supervisors, please clarify this!

The grading of your thesis is based on a scheme that evaluates the various aspects of your thesis (structure of the thesis, execution, content of the thesis). At the end, your supervisor will give you the evaluation sheet for your thesis, which will inform you transparently about how he/she arrived at the respective grade.

Ethics and communication

As this is your final thesis, we expect you to carry out the most important elements of your work yourself. You must also include an affidavit confirming that the thesis is your own work. We expect a certain degree of independence from you, an important part of which is problem-solving skills: so don't write an e-mail as soon as you encounter a problem, but first try to solve it yourself using the means at your disposal. However, if you are stuck for a long time, please contact your supervisor, as he/she will probably be able to help you. If you would like to make an appointment, you should also allow some lead time, as our diaries are often quite full (i.e. you should plan appointments a few weeks in advance). Some questions can also be clarified by e-mail. Please write short e-mails with clearly formulated questions (and attach all relevant documents) so that we know how we can help you.

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