Scientific Retreats with ‘Speed Dating’: Networking to Stimulate New Interdisciplinary Translational Research Collaborations and Team Science

Abstract

To stimulate the formation of new interdisciplinary translational research teams and innovative pilot projects, the South Carolina Clinical and Translational Research (SCTR) Institute (South Carolina Clinical and Translational Science Award, CTSA) initiated biannual scientific retreats with ‘speed dating’ networking sessions. Retreat themes were prioritized based on the following criteria; cross-cutting topic, unmet medical need, generation of novel technologies and methodologies. Each retreat begins with an external keynote speaker followed by a series of brief research presentations by local researchers focused on the retreat theme, articulating potential areas for new collaborations. After each session of presentations, there is a 30 min scientific ‘speed dating’ period during which the presenters meet with interested attendees to exchange ideas and discuss collaborations. Retreat attendees are eligible to compete for pilot project funds on the topic of the retreat theme. The 10 retreats held have had a total of 1004 participants, resulted in 61 pilot projects with new interdisciplinary teams, and 14 funded projects. The retreat format has been a successful mechanism to stimulate novel interdisciplinary research teams and innovative translational research projects. Future retreats will continue to target topics of cross-cutting importance to biomedical and public health research.

Keywords

Interdisciplinary Studies Translational Medical Research

Get full access to this article

View all access options for this article.

References

Andreasen

, Brown

. Facilitating interdisciplinary research. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press, 2004

Bennett

, Gadlin

, Levine-Finley

. Collaboration & team science: a field guide. NIH Office of the Ombudsman, 2010.

Bartek

, Disis

, Weir

. NCATS Advisory Council Working Group on the IOM Report: The CTSA Program at NIH, Draft Report May 16, 2014.

Porter

, Youtie

. How interdisciplinary is nanotechnology? J Nanopart Res 2009;11:1023–41. doi:10.1007/s11051-009-9607-0

Cummings

, Kiesler

. Who collaborates successfully? Prior experience reduces collaboration barriers in distributed interdisciplinary research. Proceedings of the ACM conference on Computer-Supported Cooperative Work. San Diego, CA: 2008.

Van der Vegt

, Janssen

. Joint impact of interdependence and group diversity on innovation. J Manag 2003;29:729–51.

Disis

, Slattery

. The road we must take: multidisciplinary team science. Sci Transl Med 2010;2:22–9.

Ameredes

, Hellmich MR , Cestone

, . The Multidisciplinary Translational Team (MTT) model for training and development of translational research investigators. Clin Transl Sci 2015;8:533–41. doi:10.1111/cts.12281

Luke

, Carothers

, Dhand

, . Breaking down silos: mapping growth of cross-disciplinary collaboration in a translational science initiative. Clin Transl Sci 2015;8:143–9. doi:10.1111/cts.12248

10.

Wuchty

, Jones

, Uzzi

. The increasing dominance of teams in production of knowledge. Science 2007;316:1036–9. doi:10.1126/science.1136099

11.

Cook

, Hilton

. Enhancing the effectiveness of team science. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press, 2015.

12.

Baker

. The science of team science. Bioscience 2015;65:639–44.

13.

Mazumdar

, Messinger

, Finkelstein

, ., Biostatistics, Epidemiology, and Research Design (BERD) Key Function Committee of the Clinical and Translational Science Awards (CTSA) Consortium. Evaluating academic scientists collaborating in team-based research: a proposed framework. Acad Med 2015;90:1302–8. doi:10.1097/ACM.0000000000000759

14.

Metzger

, Zare

. Interdisciplinary research: from belief to reality. Science 1999;283:642–3.

15.

Stokols

, Misra

, Moser

, . The ecology of team science: understanding contextual influences on transdisciplinary collaboration. Am J Prevent Med 2008;35(2 Suppl):S96–S115.

16.

Boudreau

, Brady

, Ganguli

, . A Field Experiment on Search Costs and the Formation of Scientific Collaborations. 2014. https://dx-doi-org.web.bisu.edu.cn/10.2139/ssrn.2486068https://dx-doi-org.web.bisu.edu.cn/10.2139/ssrn.2486068

17.

Nagarajan

, Peterson

, Lowe

, . Social network analysis to assess the impact of the CTSA on biomedical research grant collaboration. Clin Transl Sci 2015;8:150–4. doi:10.1111/cts.12247

18.

Obeid

, Johnson

, Stallings

, . Research networking systems: the state of adoption at institutions aiming to augment translational research infrastructure. J Transl Med Epidemiol 2014;2:1026.