Driving Medical Innovation Through Interdisciplinarity: Unique Opportunities and Challenges

Note: Funding Information: Funding agencies have traditionally rewarded independent scientists proposing research in their field of expertise rather than teams of researchers offering to conduct interdisciplinary projects. Over time, complex problems such as climate change led to increased funding for inter-or multidisciplinary research teams. Some researchers have argued that efforts to make research funding contingent on inclusion of interdisciplinarity leads to inefficiency (7). How successful such interdisciplinary focused funding approaches are remains unclear: the US National Institutes of Health (NIH) reports slightly better outcomes for funding fostering interdisciplinary funded programmes vs. conventional, projects of independent research, whereas the opposite is true for the European Research Council (ERC) (18). Funding for collaborative projects are increasingly available and are internationally well supported. For example, the European Framework Program for Research and Innovation, which includes the “Horizon 2020” (H2020) program, is the world’s largest interdisciplinary funding program (19). In the USA, the National Science Foundation (NSF) (20) and the Clinical and Translational Science Awards (CTSA) Program supports national networks of medical research institutions that collaborate to improve the efficiency of translational research, promoting the integration of underserved populations, and train future translational researchers (21). Funding Information: LW is supported by Arthritis Research UK (21953), Great Ormond Street Children’s Charity and the NIHR Biomedical Research Centres at Great Ormond Street Hospital. ML is supported by New Investigators Awards from the CIHR/KRESCENT and the Canadian Child Health Clinician Scientist Program (CCHCSP). Funding Information: 15. Schunn CD, Crowley K, Okada T. The growth of multidisciplinarity in the cognitive science society. Cogn Sci (1998) 22:107–30. doi: 10.1207/s15516709cog2201_4 16. Rajan DK, Ebner A, Desai SB, Rios JM, Cohn WE. Percutaneous creation of an arteriovenous fistula for hemodialysis access. J Vasc Interv Radiol. (2015) 26:484–90. doi: 10.1016/j.jvir.2014. 12.018 17. Roy ED, Morzillo AT, Seijo F, Reddy SMW, Rhemtulla JM, Milder JC, et al. The elusive pursuit of interdisciplinarity at the human— environment interface. Bioscience (2013) 63:745–53. doi: 10.1093/bioscience/6 3.9.745 18. Ledford H. How to solve the world’s biggest problems. Nature (2015) 525:308– 11. doi: 10.1038/525308a 19. Quests for Interdisciplinarity: A Challenge for the ERA and HORIZON 2020. Publications Office (2015). Available online at: https://www.nap.edu/catalog/ 9942/bridging-disciplines-in-the-brain-behavioral-and-clinical-sciences 20. Introduction to Interdisciplinary Research. NSF - National Science Foundation (2004). Available online at: https://www.nsf.gov/od/oia/ additional_resources/interdisciplinary_research/index.jsp (Accessed July 12, 2018).