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Boundary-spanning in emerging technology research: determinants of funding success for academic scientists

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Abstract

Emerging technologies, including nanotechnologies, are generally seen as those latest scientific innovations which have a potential impact on industry structure, and commercialization and economic potential. Work in this area of emerging technologies has distinct boundary spanning characteristics from the perspective of academic science. First, many emerging technologies involve collaboration of scientists across disciplinary boundaries. Second, because of the commercializability of many emerging technologies, scientists may interact more often with industry throughout the research and commercialization process. We ask, what are the boundary-spanning characteristics of scientists engaged in emerging technology research and how do those characteristics matter in obtaining funding in this area? We examine the characteristics of academic scientists in the United States who are employed in research intensive institutions and who are engaged in funded research in the area of emerging technologies. We address the factors that predict their grant success in areas of emerging technology. Findings reveal that interdisciplinary activities and industry orientation are both important in predicting funding in areas of emerging technology. Moreover, the findings imply that the emergence of new technologies may offer opportunities for women in low representation fields.

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Notes

  1. Non responses due to bad addresses were also removed for the calculation of response rate. For example, 136 of the emails were “bounced back” due to a bad email address and 19 were “returned to sender” by the recipients’ university email servers.

  2. http://www.technologyreview.com/article/16465/.

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Acknowledgments

Many thanks to the scientists who contributed data to this project, and to Dr. Laurel Smith-Doerr and the anonymous reviewers for their thoughtful comments. Thank you also to the National Science Foundation for their support of this work. Data analyzed in this paper were collected as part of the 2005–2009 project, “Women in Science and Engineering: Network Access, Participation, and Career Outcomes,” (NETWISE 2006) a project funded by the National Science Foundation (Grant # REC-0529642) (Co-PI’s Dr. Julia Melkers and Dr. Eric Welch.). Opinions expressed in this paper are not necessarily shared by the Georgia Institute of Technology or the University of Illinois at Chicago.

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  1. School of Public Policy, Georgia Institute of Technology, Atlanta, GA, 30332, USA

    Julia Melkers & Fang Xiao

  2. Andrew Young School of Public Policy, Georgia State University, Atlanta, GA, 30302, USA

    Fang Xiao

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  1. Julia Melkers
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Correspondence to Julia Melkers.

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Melkers, J., Xiao, F. Boundary-spanning in emerging technology research: determinants of funding success for academic scientists. J Technol Transf 37, 251–270 (2012). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10961-010-9173-8

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