Impact of Granting Research Fund on Interdisciplinarity of Research Outcomes

在这项研究项目的第一部分，通过使用每个领域的研究出版物的元数据，对研究的跨学科性及其对解决三个选定研究领域(纳米药物输送、合成生物学和自主车辆)中新出现的技术问题的贡献之间的关系进行了实证检验。这项研究发现，跨学科研究对解决三个研究领域中的每一个新出现的技术主题都有独特的贡献。根据这一发现，有人认为，需要为跨学科研究提供更积极的资金支持，以加快新技术的出现。这项研究已经发表在《研究评估》上。在第二部分，我研究了研究资金分配在跨学科研究对技术创新的贡献中的作用。实证分析基于2010年70万篇期刊论文的元数据。我对研究论文的跨学科性与其技术影响之间的相关性的分析表明，只有当研究源于受资助的项目时，跨学科研究才会对技术发展产生更大的影响。这一发现表明，资金分配过程作为一种制度工具，选择性地支持可能产生技术影响的跨学科研究。这一发现是在佐治亚理工学院与同事们的在线研讨会上提出的，该研究论文目前正在一本期刊上进行审查。

In the first part of this research project, the relationship between the interdisciplinarity of research and its contribution to addressing emerging technological issues within three selected research domains (Nano-enable drug delivery, Synthetic biology, and Autonomous vehicles) was empirically examined by using the metadata of the research publications in each field. This research discovered that interdisciplinary research distinctively contributes to addressing emerging technological topics in each of the three research domains. From this finding, It is argued that more active funding supports for interdisciplinary research need to accelerate the emergence of new technology. This research has been published in Research Evaluation.In the second part, I examine the role of research funding allocations in the way interdisciplinary research contributes to technological innovation. The empirical analysis is based on the metadata of the 0.7 million journal papers in 2010. My analysis on the correlation between a research paper's interdisciplinarity and its technological impact shows that interdisciplinary research has been more impactful to technology development only when the research was originated from funded projects. This finding suggests that the funding allocation process functions as an institutional instrument for selectively supporting interdisciplinary research that could have a technology impact. This finding was presented in an online workshop with colleagues at Georgia Tech and the research paper is currently under review in a journal.