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Prof. Alexander Kabanov
The Big Challenges: How Can we Stop Preparing for the Last War? “It is a joke in Britain to say that the War Office is always preparing for the last war.” (1948 Winston S. Churchill) Panel Presentation (https://goo.gl/Pm84Vx ) |
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I would like to point out three current trends in science and briefly discuss their implications in the context of our round table theme.
1. It is well known that conducting “interdisciplinary studies” is important because breakthrough discoveries happen “at the interfaces” of sciences. However, this concept has been around since the “last war” (if not the one before that). For about two decades already we have witnessed an increasingly complex and accelerated convergence of the sciences, i.e. their interpenetration to the extent that the interfaces between science disciplines actually disappear. The number of the converging disciplines is not two or three but sometimes a dozen at a time and the situation is dynamic—first, no convergence is needed in the absence of a specific goal, and, second, it is impossible to know in advance what disciplines will be needed to accomplish this goal. Since the goals change in response to emerging challenges, due to the nature of convergence, the sciences, research methods, and scientists that are needed for scientific advancements cannot be assembled beforehand within a single organization. Of course, strong universities and interdisciplinary centers are needed to attain critical mass and next-door availability of research expertise and tools. However, “the future war” cannot be won without stimulating dynamic bonds between diverse scientists not only across the nation, but also across the globe. The science funding organizations and administering structures should focus on this. It is also important to understand that convergence is not a new scientific discipline but a characteristic of a state of science. This imposes tremendous challenges, including in education, since it is necessary to define the minimal set of knowledge essential to any scientist to move freely between different scientific disciplines. Based on my experience as a “convergent scientist,” all my scientific life I have worked in the areas, in which initially I was not a specialist. This is not a joke but a reality of modern science that imposes new and challenging requirements in education, training of scientists, as well as science organization and funding.
2. Today’s disrupting technologies are increasingly a result of the efforts of individual investigators rather than large scientific organizations or state enterprises, organized like the Manhattan project. To be exact, the top-down approach remains important in traditional areas, such as nuclear power, space, oil and gas sphere. But in the new areas, such as materials, biomedicine, computer technologies and the like, the initiative of individual investigators heading relatively small teams play a decisive role. This trend may be fundamentally related to the first one – convergence. Today, it is necessary to maximize the potential of individual scientists and investigator-initiated research. Much was achieved in Russia in this direction, but so much more must be done, because Russian institutions and society at large are prone to administering and favoring collectivism over individuality. One would expect that traditional groups of interest would oppose such a tendency insisting on the use of the tools that worked in the “last war”. The necessary requirements for building the science of the future include modernization of the archaic scientific institutes, changing the culture of the scientific process, and strengthening of the competitive funding mechanisms along with creating flexible opportunities for integration of scientists into interdisciplinary teams on both a national and global scale.
3. Today’s technology breakthroughs in increasing proportion are achieved by the private sector, often startup companies, rather than by state structures. I don’t have to look far for an example - my colleague in North Carolina Joseph DeSimone recently invented a 3D printing technology that uniquely allows ultrafast, reproducible manufacturing of complex polymeric objects directly from liquid monomer. It has only been four years since he founded Cabon3D, and the company is already one of the top ten robotics companies disrupting 3D printing, and has signed deals worth over a hundred million dollars including one with Adidas for mass production of sports shoes. How one can achieve such an incredible result? Much was said about a need of legislation like the American Bayh-Dole Act, funding of grants to support innovation, creation of techno-parks and other measures aimed to overcome “the valley of death” by de-risking investments in innovation. All these measures are of course needed. But even in the United States where they are implemented, there are not so many examples like the one of DeSimone and we can’t stop being amazed by these examples. The problem is that the mechanics of academic research and the advancement of products to the market are orthogonal to each other and this restrains the ability of a scientist to think in a way that is needed for the commercial success.1 Therefore, a cultural revolution within the minds of scientists is necessary so that they can advance their ideas to the market while preserving creativity typical for academia. Private philanthropic funding could play a tremendous role in this regard by creating new institutes of development that stimulate scientists innovative work.
1 Gaymalov Z, Kabanov A. RECOPE: How to succeed in bringing ideas from academia to market without compromising ingenuity. Nanomedicine: Nanotechnology, Biology and Medicine 2017, 13(3):795-800. doi: 10.1016/j.nano.2016.10.007
Panel Presentation (https://goo.gl/Pm84Vx )
1. It is well known that conducting “interdisciplinary studies” is important because breakthrough discoveries happen “at the interfaces” of sciences. However, this concept has been around since the “last war” (if not the one before that). For about two decades already we have witnessed an increasingly complex and accelerated convergence of the sciences, i.e. their interpenetration to the extent that the interfaces between science disciplines actually disappear. The number of the converging disciplines is not two or three but sometimes a dozen at a time and the situation is dynamic—first, no convergence is needed in the absence of a specific goal, and, second, it is impossible to know in advance what disciplines will be needed to accomplish this goal. Since the goals change in response to emerging challenges, due to the nature of convergence, the sciences, research methods, and scientists that are needed for scientific advancements cannot be assembled beforehand within a single organization. Of course, strong universities and interdisciplinary centers are needed to attain critical mass and next-door availability of research expertise and tools. However, “the future war” cannot be won without stimulating dynamic bonds between diverse scientists not only across the nation, but also across the globe. The science funding organizations and administering structures should focus on this. It is also important to understand that convergence is not a new scientific discipline but a characteristic of a state of science. This imposes tremendous challenges, including in education, since it is necessary to define the minimal set of knowledge essential to any scientist to move freely between different scientific disciplines. Based on my experience as a “convergent scientist,” all my scientific life I have worked in the areas, in which initially I was not a specialist. This is not a joke but a reality of modern science that imposes new and challenging requirements in education, training of scientists, as well as science organization and funding.
2. Today’s disrupting technologies are increasingly a result of the efforts of individual investigators rather than large scientific organizations or state enterprises, organized like the Manhattan project. To be exact, the top-down approach remains important in traditional areas, such as nuclear power, space, oil and gas sphere. But in the new areas, such as materials, biomedicine, computer technologies and the like, the initiative of individual investigators heading relatively small teams play a decisive role. This trend may be fundamentally related to the first one – convergence. Today, it is necessary to maximize the potential of individual scientists and investigator-initiated research. Much was achieved in Russia in this direction, but so much more must be done, because Russian institutions and society at large are prone to administering and favoring collectivism over individuality. One would expect that traditional groups of interest would oppose such a tendency insisting on the use of the tools that worked in the “last war”. The necessary requirements for building the science of the future include modernization of the archaic scientific institutes, changing the culture of the scientific process, and strengthening of the competitive funding mechanisms along with creating flexible opportunities for integration of scientists into interdisciplinary teams on both a national and global scale.
3. Today’s technology breakthroughs in increasing proportion are achieved by the private sector, often startup companies, rather than by state structures. I don’t have to look far for an example - my colleague in North Carolina Joseph DeSimone recently invented a 3D printing technology that uniquely allows ultrafast, reproducible manufacturing of complex polymeric objects directly from liquid monomer. It has only been four years since he founded Cabon3D, and the company is already one of the top ten robotics companies disrupting 3D printing, and has signed deals worth over a hundred million dollars including one with Adidas for mass production of sports shoes. How one can achieve such an incredible result? Much was said about a need of legislation like the American Bayh-Dole Act, funding of grants to support innovation, creation of techno-parks and other measures aimed to overcome “the valley of death” by de-risking investments in innovation. All these measures are of course needed. But even in the United States where they are implemented, there are not so many examples like the one of DeSimone and we can’t stop being amazed by these examples. The problem is that the mechanics of academic research and the advancement of products to the market are orthogonal to each other and this restrains the ability of a scientist to think in a way that is needed for the commercial success.1 Therefore, a cultural revolution within the minds of scientists is necessary so that they can advance their ideas to the market while preserving creativity typical for academia. Private philanthropic funding could play a tremendous role in this regard by creating new institutes of development that stimulate scientists innovative work.
1 Gaymalov Z, Kabanov A. RECOPE: How to succeed in bringing ideas from academia to market without compromising ingenuity. Nanomedicine: Nanotechnology, Biology and Medicine 2017, 13(3):795-800. doi: 10.1016/j.nano.2016.10.007
Panel Presentation (https://goo.gl/Pm84Vx )
