UW-Madison Dissertations and Theses
To locate UW-Madison dissertations and master's theses, search MadCat. All dissertations and theses required by the department for submission to the library are cataloged in MadCat. If you do not find a dissertation or thesis in MadCat, go to the department. Full-text PDF files of Ph.D. dissertations completed 1997 or later are available through Current Research@UW-Madison or ProQuest Digital Dissertations.
MadCat
To search by author or title, select the Basic Search mode and search by Author Browse or Title.
To search by topic or department, use the Basic Search mode and search by Keywords. Search Keywords with Location Limit “Theses collections.” The limit “Theses collections” works for both dissertations and theses.
- In MadCat, select Basic Search.
- Click on Set More Limits.
- Using Location pull-down menu, click on Theses collections, and then click on Set More Limits. You will see the phrase Search Limits are in effect above the search box. Any search you do now will be limited to items in the Theses collections.
- Enter keywords.
To search by topic, type in a keyword.
Example: neutrinos
To search by department, type skey followed by department name.
Example: skey physics
Current Research@UW-Madison (UW-Madison access only)
Database of UW-Madison dissertations only that includes indexing from 1892, abstracts from 1980, and full text (PDF files) from 1997.
Other Dissertations and Theses
There are several databases for identifying dissertations and theses from other universities. They are especially useful for finding out what has been written on a topic. They contain citations often with abstracts and sometimes with full text and can be searched by word, phrase, school, advisor, year, department, etc.
Dissertation Database Options
View our tipsheet for finding other dissertations and theses