Research Proposal to Email a Supervisor: 2 Pages

Research Proposal to Email a Supervisor: 2 Pages

A proposal you email to a potential supervisor should fit on two pages: one question, why it is still open, a method that supervisor's group could actually run, and what you have already done. Our cap is about 700 words plus up to five references, and shorter is fine. It is a pitch for a conversation, not the formal proposal you submit later.

Keep two documents apart. The formal proposal you submit with the application carries the literature review, timeline and ethics; our UK example of one runs 1,500 words. The short version you send first has one job: make a busy academic reply "yes, let's talk about this". Put the timeline and the full literature review in it and you bury the question. When the draft is ready, our research proposal review reads it for a clear question, methods and fit.

Every university page quoted below was checked on October 31, 2026. Supervisor-contact rules differ by department, so recheck the page for your own program.

When a supervisor needs to see your idea first

Some UK routes make supervisor contact part of the process. Others only recommend it. Read the wording:

Imperial adds that the email "should be a formal email, which shows that you have done your research into their particular research expertise and past research work." If you are applying to an advertised, funded project instead, the project already exists, and Imperial says "your supervisor will usually be the academic who made the funding application." A pre-proposal is for the self-proposed route.

The best public spec for the short version

No UK page we checked defines a pre-application proposal. The clearest public spec we found comes from a Dutch PhD vacancy. The University of Amsterdam's ILLC advertised a PhD position (application deadline September 6, 2025, now closed) that asked for:

"An one-page research proposal outlining a possible focus for your PhD project within the theme. It does not need to be fully developed but should demonstrate your ability to formulate an interesting and feasible research direction, including, for instance, clear research question or set of questions, a theoretical background and expectations, and a research strategy."

UvA ILLC vacancy, quoted as written, including "An one-page".

Read the qualifiers: "does not need to be fully developed", "feasible", "for instance". That is the genre. The reader checks whether you can formulate a question and a plausible way in. They are not checking a finished design.

Imperial's formal research statement uses the same logic at greater length (2–3 pages). It "should describe a research problem or area that you are interested in, and your initial ideas on the research work towards solving the problem, referring to existing scientific literature where appropriate," and it "does not constitute a commitment to carry out the exact research you have described."

Our view: treat the UvA brief as the spec for any pre-proposal, and add one block it leaves out: what you have already done. Basis: a supervisor reading cold has no CV context yet, and your preparation is the main evidence that the question is feasible for you. The countercase: if the supervisor names a length or format, theirs wins. If the program then requires a structured form, the pre-proposal is only for the conversation. Helsinki's doctoral form, for example, says "Free form research plans are not accepted."

Two pages, five blocks

The caps and the total are our arithmetic. Check the page count in your own layout, and cut block 2 first if you run over.

What to leave for the formal proposal: the timeline, ethics detail, a full literature review, risk tables and a provisional thesis structure. Our 1,500-word UK PhD proposal example shows those sections built out.

Constructed example: a two-page pre-proposal

Constructed example, written by us, not a real applicant's proposal. Context (invented): Tanvir Hasan, MSc in Electrical and Electronic Engineering from a Bangladeshi university, writing to a UK academic who works on battery ageing. References are shown as placeholders on purpose: never cite papers you have not read. The claims about battery research in it are placeholders tied to those markers, not facts this page states.

Working title: Predicting battery ageing in off-grid solar home systems from charge-controller logs

Question. Can the voltage and current logs that low-cost charge controllers already record predict lead-acid and lithium battery capacity loss in rural solar home systems early enough to schedule replacement?

Why it is open. Battery ageing models are mostly built and validated on laboratory cycling data or grid-scale storage [Ref 1, Ref 2]. Solar home systems age batteries under deep, irregular discharge and high ambient heat, which laboratory protocols rarely reproduce [Ref 3]. Field studies of these systems usually measure capacity at the end of life, not during it [Ref 4]. So operators replace batteries when customers complain, not when data says they should. What is not known is whether the coarse, noisy logs that cheap controllers produce carry enough signal to predict capacity loss months ahead.

Approach. I would start from an existing log archive: two Bangladeshi installers I worked with have agreed in principle to share anonymised controller logs from installed systems, subject to a data agreement. Step one is to measure capacity directly on a subset of returned batteries and pair it with each battery's log history. Step two is to compare a physics-based equivalent-circuit model fitted to the logs with a data-driven model trained on the same features, and test which predicts measured capacity better on batteries it has not seen. If the logs prove too coarse, the fallback is a small field trial with a higher-resolution logger on a sample of new installations, which would at least show what resolution is needed.

What I have already done. My MSc thesis built an equivalent-circuit model of a 12 V lead-acid battery and fitted it to bench cycling data I collected. I wrote the parameter-fitting code and found that the model drifted badly once temperature rose above the range I had tested, which is the problem this project starts from. For two years I also worked on a solar installer's maintenance team, so I know what the controller logs contain and where they fail.

Fit with your group. Your group's work on estimating battery health from partial charge data [Ref 5] is the closest method to step two. I would want to test whether that approach survives the much noisier field logs, and your battery testing facility would make the direct capacity measurements in step one possible.

References [Ref 1]–[Ref 5]: five papers the applicant has actually read, cited in full.

The text from "Working title" to the end of the fit block is 393 words, under every block cap. A version that fills two pages adds detail to blocks 2 and 3 first, because those are where a supervisor tests feasibility. Every sentence does one of the five jobs in the table. Note what is absent: no timeline, no ethics section, no claim that the project will "revolutionise" anything. The one data-access sentence matters most for feasibility, so it is stated with its condition ("agreed in principle", "subject to a data agreement"). If you do not have access agreed, say so and make the fallback the main plan.

The email that carries it

Keep the email short and let the PDF do the work. Five lines:

1. One sentence: who you are and the program and intake you plan to apply for.
2. The working title and question, in one sentence.
3. One sentence on why their work, naming a specific paper.
4. "I attach a two-page outline" (only if they asked for one or the department invites it; otherwise "I can send a two-page outline").
5. The ask: would they be willing to discuss supervising it?

Our guide to contacting a PhD supervisor has a full UK template and the rule on unsolicited attachments. Name the PDF with your surname and the working title, and send it as a PDF, never pasted into the email body.

After you send it

Three things can happen. If the supervisor replies with comments, revise the outline and turn it into the formal proposal. Our page on using supervisor feedback on a PhD proposal covers how. If they reply with interest or ask for a call, see what to do when a professor replies positively. If there is no reply, our follow-up email guide covers when to write once more and when to move on.

Questions about short research proposals

How many references should a two-page proposal have?

Our recommendation is three to five, each one tied to a sentence in block 2 or block 5. None of the pages we checked sets a number for the short version.

Will I be held to the proposal?

Not at Imperial, which says its research statement "does not constitute a commitment to carry out the exact research you have described." Expect the project to change after you talk with the supervisor. That is the point of sending it early.

Can I send the same short proposal to two supervisors?

Blocks 1 to 4 can stay the same. Block 5 must be rewritten for each person, and each email goes separately, never with other supervisors in copy.

Is the short proposal the same as a statement of purpose?

No. The proposal is about the project. A statement or personal statement is about you and your preparation. Our comparison of a research statement, SOP and research proposal sets out the differences.

What if the supervisor asks for a one-page version?

Keep blocks 1, 3 and 5. Cut block 2 to two sentences and block 4 to one. UvA's one-page brief, quoted above, shows that one page is enough to show a question and a strategy. If the supervisor asks for the full document, see the master's-by-research proposal in the UK guide.

If the supervisor is in Hong Kong and you plan to apply for HKPFS, write the full HKPFS proposal to the department's format.

If the proposal is for the application itself, see the admission research proposal for a Canadian master's.

Get a free review of your research proposal

Get a free Quick Review of your research proposal against GradPilot's PhD research proposal rubric for UK, Irish and Australian applications. It reads whether your proposal sets out a clear, worthwhile project the department can supervise and you can complete, covering the question, literature, methods, resources and fit with the department.

More PhD proposal and supervisor guides:

• PhD research proposal example: UK, 1,500 words: the formal proposal this one grows into.
• Contacting a PhD supervisor: email templates: the first email in full.
• PhD proposal: use supervisor feedback well: the revision after the first reply.
• All doctoral guides are in the PhD essays hub.

Sources

Retrieved October 31, 2026, except where noted.

• Imperial College London, PhD in Electrical and Electronic Engineering (no year stated): supervisor discussion for self-proposed projects, formal email, research statement scope and non-commitment.
• University of Manchester, Pakistan: country-specific information (no year stated): initial enquiries strongly recommended; proposal required.
• University of Glasgow, Postgraduate research (redirect target of the "how to apply for a research degree" page; no year stated): optional supervisor contact.
• University of Amsterdam ILLC, PhD position on improving social media using large language models (deadline September 6, 2025, closed; cited as a specification example): one-page proposal brief.
• University of Helsinki, Application form and research plan (no year stated): free-form research plans not accepted.