SMVDU Katra, 22^ndAug,18. Mr. Sandeep Kumar, a PhD student of the School of Physics at Shri Mata Vaishno Devi University, Katra defended his doctoral dissertation in a committee chaired by Dr. Sanjeev Jain, Honourable Vice-Chancellor, SMVDU. The oral defence of Mr. Sandeep’s thesis, titled ‘Growth and Characterisation of Transition Metal Doped Europium Oxide Thin Films’ was conducted on 21 August 2018 at 11.30 am in the university committee room, comprising external examiner Prof. Pratima Sen of Devi Ahalya University, Indore; Dean &HoD of the School of Physics; and the supervisor, Dr. Ram Prakash as approved by the Vice Chancellor. A power-point presentation followed up with questions raised by the committee members defended by the PhD candidate during his defence. Previously, Mr. Sandeep Kumar’s research was carried out at UGC DAE CSR and RRCAT, Indore under collaborative research scheme. Notably, the bright candidate has published many research papers in international SCI & SCOPUS indexed journals, and the candidate also received many awards in national conferences for his poster presentations. Mr. Sandeep Kumar thanked the committee members, particularly Dr. Sanjeev Jain, honourable Vice-Chancellor, SMVDU for sparing his time and for his kind comments.