Title: Crossdisciplinary practices in a specialty of bionanotechnology
1Cross-disciplinary practices in a specialty of
bionanotechnology
SSTNET, Manchester, April 7th 2006
- Ismael Rafols and Martin Meyer, SPRU
- University of Sussex, Brighton
2Interdisciplinarity in the policy discourse
- New modes of knowledge production (Gibbons et
al.) - Mode 2 is interdisciplinary (trans-) and
problem-oriented research. - Emerging technologies (biotech,nanotech)
- viewed as a result of convergence of disciplines
3Bionanotechnology
- BBSRC multidisciplinary area that sits at the
interface between engineering and the biological
and physical sciences. - OECD it covers the interface between physics,
biology, chemistry and engineering sciences.
However Schummer (2004) found that publishing
practices in nanotech are essentially
mono-disciplinary
4Research questions
- Challenging the normative discourses of
- new modes of knowledge production
- Is bionanotechnology as
- cross-disciplinary as it is claimed?
- In which sense?
- How is this cross-disciplinarity achieved?
52. Conceptual and methodological approach
- Discipline A social construct
- Specialty The arena of research
- Laboratory The repository of tacit knowledge
- Research-project Sequential and coherent set of
publications by () same authors. - Not a hierarchical (Russian dolls) scheme
- Multiple overlaps between units at different
levels
6How to measure cross-disciplinarity?
- Need to operationalise concepts proposed by
sociology of science - (J.T. Klein, 1990 Weingart, 2000)
- Bibliometric indicators
- Lack of consensus concerning the adequate
indicators - (Porter and Chubin, 1985 Bordons et al. 2004)
- Multi-dimensional approach
- (Sanz-Menendez et al., 2001 Grigg et al., 2003)
- Various aspects Affiliation, researchers
background, references, citations
7Operational research questions
- In which dimensions is Molecular motors
- cross-disciplinary?
- Which strategies are pursued in research projects
in order to garner cross-disciplinarity?
8Multiple-case study
- Bionanotechnology is a mixed bag with very
different research specialties. For meaningful
comparison we need research projects in one
specialty of bionanotechnology. - Molecular motors
- study of proteins that use chemical energy to
generate movement at a subcellular level - Selection criteria
- Important contributions of Japanese researchers
on the mechanistic dynamics of any of any of the
biological molecular motors. - Data Interviews, publications and other
published sources.
93. Empirical findings
10Affiliations
11Background of researchers
Classification Method Question in interview
and publication record Background of each
research Main discipline of practice
12References
Classification Method Examination of title and
abstract of each reference
13Instrumentalities
14Summary empirical findings
15Knowledge-sourcing strategies
164. Conclusions
- Difference between
- Social practices (less cross-disciplinary)
- Cognitive practices (consistently
cross-disciplinary) - A variety of strategies to garner knowledge
- Recruitment
- In-house development
- Collaboration
17Trade-off between cross-disciplinarity and
integration
- Cost of integration
- Coordination and communication extra effort.
- Attribution of authorship
- Hypothesis
- Labs seek the maximum cognitive diversity at the
minimum cost - Various possible successful strategies
- Some labs try to achieve cognitive diversity
without going through the costs of social
cross-disciplinary - Other labs engage into social cross-disciplinarity
managing well the effort for integration.
185. Discussion
- Mode 1 (organic) vs. Mode 2 (policy-driven)
- cross-disciplinarity
- (Fujigaki 2002 Bruce et al. 2004)
- Dynamics found suggest dominance of Mode 1
- Driven by researchers (not institution)
- Social aspects of discipline still important
19Caveats
- This is an exploratory study.
- Results will be checked with further bibliometric
analysis. - Just one specialty (invisible college) of
Bionanotechnology To be compared with results in
other invisible colleges. - Anecdotal observation suggests that dominance of
Mode 1 or Mode 2 is contingent on the type of
research - even for research communities carrying similar
research.
20Acknowledgements
- Thanks for fruitful comments to Nick von
Tunzelmann, Jacky Senker and Paul Nightingale. - Funded by a Marie Curie Postdoctoral Fellowship
(2006-08) and the Daiwa Anglo-Japanese Foundation
(2005).