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How to Promote Interdisciplinary / High Risk Research?

• Establish an European Center for Interdisciplinary Research it could be distributed and / or itinerant (like CNRS)
• Main Task: to host 'instant' 'disposable' institutes on emerging interdisciplinary / high risk/ high stakes issues
• The members of the 'disposable institutes' will hold Tenure-Track European Interdisciplinary Chairs independent on the fate of the disposable institutes Thus ECIR will 'insure'/'cover' their risk taking
• The tenure-track can end in tenured (ECIR) European Interdisciplinary Professorships
• Researchers will be selected / promoted at ECIR on the basis of their proven expertise to carry out interdisciplinary research as such.

Instruments of the European Center for Interdisciplinary Research

• gradual, according to how ripe is the recipient subject
• triangle: 2 advisors+ bridge PhD student (100K €) (support summer schools for meeting, visits, fellowship)
• 6-12 month interdisciplinary institute programs (500 K €) (buy sabbaticals for professors + bring students)
• 3-5 year 'disposable' institutes (3-5 M €)

university hosting it, should be well compensated and could keep the institute after the 3 years.

participants: local people + students + visitors + holders of the European Interdisciplinary tenure(-track) chairs to provide expertise with interdisciplinary projects

Evaluating interdisciplinary proposals

In emergent research situations beyond the known frontiers it is not clear what knowledge will be relevant next

Thus strong professional expertise in a strictly limited area is less important than the generic capability / know-how to conduct research in situations of uncertainty and in unchartered trans-/ extra- disciplinary territory

Thus the judges should consider the overall interdisciplinary

• expertise
• scientific connections and
• past achievements

ease in navigating within dynamic research networks rather then

• individual disciplinary authority and position
• ease in managing static large disciplinary research groups

Algorithm to Evaluate Interdisciplinary researchers relevance

- map the interdisciplinary cooperation network
(- people are nodes - cooperations and common papers, are links).

- give priority to people with high interdisciplinarity rather then high rank / disciplinary authority

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