Generating knowledge: a reflection of CNRS’s vitality and interdisciplinarity -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- A kick start to interdisciplinary work ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- With an annual budget of €7 million, the CNRS Mission for Interdisciplinarity (MI) further strengthens one of the organization’s founding principles. It proposes interdisciplinary themes that can involve other research organizations, universities, the industry and regional authorities. To promote these new projects at the interface between disciplines, MI provides researchers with a wide range of tools. These include first and foremost the ‘great challenges’ projects, designed to address the needs of society or to build a new research community. ‘A great challenge is a long-term one—spanning at least five years. It entails certain risks, but also provides a certain amount of freedom,’ says Pierre Guillon, first Director of the Mission. One such ‘great challenge’ is the ‘Nuclear Power, Energy, the Environment, Wastes, and Society’—or NEEDS—project, identified in 2011 and backed by key stakeholders in the nuclear sector, including CEA, AREVA, and EDF. CNRS has earmarked a €1.2 million budget for the program. First Support Exploratory Projects (PEPS) are another instrument for novel research over a one-year period, prior to the agencies’ calls for proposals. In 2011, MI identified a dozen PEPS covering topics such as law, economics, and the environment—not to mention therapeutic innovation or the interaction between biology, information technology, and mathematics. ‘Most scientitsts choose periodicals specialized in their field to publish their works,’ says Joël Bertrand. ‘Yet for some institutes such as the Institute of Ecology and Environment (INEE) and the Institute for Engi- neering and Systems Sciences (INSIS), research stretches across seve- ral scientific disciplines, which is an example of interdisciplinary work.’ An international beacon CNRS’s contribution to generating knowledge extends beyond natio- nal borders: articles co-authored with foreign partners represent over half of the organization’s publications. Studies in 2011 show that in material and life sciences (excluding medical research), more than one third of publications by CNRS-affiliated research units were co- authored with a country from the European Research Area, parti- cularly in Earth sciences and astronomy (48%) and physics (38%). CNRS’s main international partners include the US (15% of CNRS publications), Germany (10%), and the UK (9%). ‘The number of co- publications with China and Russia has also increased recently,’ Anne-Laure Derepas points out. ‘This is partly due to the fact that for a long time, scientific journals in these countries were not published in English and were thus not accounted for in the sources. But as ties with China and Russia get stronger, the number of co-authored articles An indicator of interdisciplinarity is on the rise, and this trend can only intensify in the coming years.’ In 2011 CNRS decided to further promote interdisciplinary work (see box). ‘Most scientific or technological breakthroughs occur at A tool for site policy the interface between disciplines,’ says Joël Bertrand. ‘Our job is to identify, promote, and assess them.’ The The number of publications will play an increasing role in the im- amount of publications by units involved plemention of CNRS’s site policy. ‘We hope CNRS and its partners in interdisciplinary projects will be evi- consider data on scientific production as an indicator of areas of dence of the effectiveness of this new excellence at a site. This would help build a coordinated scientific approach in the organization’s scientific policy,’ says Jean-Noël Verpeaux, Director of the Department for policy in years to come. In this regard, the Territorial Structuring of Research. CNRS started to reflect on processes for identifying how interdisciplinary work is Methodological note expressed via publications. Journals fea- The bibliometric indicators in this section refer to 2010 and not to 2011, due to turing scientific articles already provide the necessary delay for recording publications in the database and feeding the an insight into interdisciplinary work. data, in particular for identifying CNRS-affiliated research units. ‘Scientific or technological breakthroughs occur at the interface between disciplines. Our job is to identify them.’ Joël Bertrand, Chief Research Officer 9 2011 A year at CNRS
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