Hi all, thanks for all this help/advice. With regard to the available literature: there is lots of literature relating to the general area, 'theories' and some good examples, but in regard to the very specific area there are only 3 published pieces of work and they all are aimed at the 'general public' and/or the tourist industry - there are no serious academic works, no-one has done a detailed study of this previously. (I don't have his permission to be posting here, so the best I can say re subject is 'Earth Sciences' and the specific area is a tightly bound 26 acres of land!! Sorry, best I can do, folks). Somewhat shocked about the costs, Ian, as I do know that he hasn't got that much money - he has really only budgeted for the fees!!! Maybe I should tell him to forget the PhD - just write a book!!!

My friend needs some serious help/advice which I am not qualified to give, so here's hoping that someone out there can help. Doing his undergrad degree he hit on a dissertation topic which completely consumed him; he got 70% for the dissertation and finished with a 2:1 and had already told his supervisor that he wanted to take his dissertation research straight through to a PhD and the supervisor seemed keen. That was in March. Since then he has had to chase his supervisors (2 of them now) for interviews/advice/help with submission etc. They are never available, never return emails etc and the whole thing is really getting him down (he is entirely self-funded and a mature student). So, a couple of months ago, he took his idea to another university; met with 2 lecturers who both seemed really keen on his proposal and told him to submit it alongside an application for a MRes. Today he has had contact from 1 of the 'new' supervisors who told him that they had reviewed his proposal and that he needed to give them more indication as to how the literature relates to his topic. 1 of the reasons for doing this topic is that there isn't any specific research/literature on this detailed area - no-one has done anything on this specific area before - so today he is really depressed and down, feeling that he is getting nowhere and so desperately wanting to do this PhD - he has continued his research ever since starting his undergrad dissertation, a total of almost 3 years work already! Why are supervisors so difficult? He will be paying the fees himself and is sooo keen to do this research, why does it seem as though he has to keep on and on and on at a university/supervisors to be accepted as a PhD student? I understand that the work is difficult and the research is hard but that is irrelevant if he can't get past the front door!