Biomedical Engineering Reference
In-Depth Information
explore, be curious, and ask innocently outlandish questions. It is this creative
drive, when used synergistically with others, that we call “collaborative innova-
tion”; it may be the foundation of all the solutions to the world's greatest
problems, as this chapter will describe.
As a reader of this chapter, you may be questioning the veracity of these
statements. Traditional thinking has said that it has been the lonesome inven-
tor or experimenter that has created the scientifi c breakthroughs of the modern
age. You may be thinking of the founders of modern scientifi c inquiry—
Leonardo Da Vinci, Isaac Newton, and Louis Pasteur, slaving singly in their
laboratories or pouring over textbooks in isolation.
The primary reason individual quests were responsible for most of the
historical scientifi c innovation is because their world was structured neither
for ease of collaboration nor for sharing of ideas and data across boundaries.
Travel, communication, and information systems were limited and diffi cult.
The structural changes of the latter half of the twentieth century changed all
that. Science of the past was isolated and individualistic; science of the present
and future will increasingly be (and is rapidly becoming) far more connected
and collaborative.
2.2 COLLABORATIVE IMPERATIVE
2.2.1 Driving Forces in Scientifi c Discovery Today
Technology has not become the great simplifi er of our lives, as once predicted.
Instead, technology has
enabled
and
accelerated complexity
and
change
. Within
our fast-moving, rapidly changing world, innovation has shifted its venue from
the individual to the group; almost all innovation today is done collaboratively,
in teams, networks, or alliances. This is true not only for scientists but also for
those who must commercialize innovations and those who must address the
legal complications of bioethical decisions.
To grapple with this complexity, multidisciplinary teams are essential,
because, in most cases, it is impossible for one person to grapple with all the
intricate information required to create breakthroughs. And most break-
throughs are happening not within a fi eld or specialty but between fi elds. These
multidisciplinary breakthroughs are not just complex, they are also very
expensive. Thus it becomes imperative for companies, universities, and labo-
ratories to work in a seamless, synchronistic, and synergistic manner.
The Langer Laboratory at MIT is a perfect example, as Dr. Robert Langer
describes [1] :
My lab has people with 10-12 different disciplines in it—molecular biologists,
cell biologists, clinicians, pharmacists, chemical engineers, electrical engineers,
materials scientists, physicists, and others. Many of our ideas—such as tissue
engineering—require these different disciplines to move from concept to clinical
practice. It makes it possible to do nearly anything “discipline wise” in the lab.
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