As the complexity of performing science increases, collaboration is becoming increasingly necessary to accomplish great things. Collaboration may occur across disciplines, continents and type of environments, but regardless of scope, there are a number of challenges and opportunities in moving forward in this new era of collaborative science especially for young scientists lacking broad networks and experience working with diverse groups of people.
Here at MD Anderson* we’re paving the way for novel types of interactions to become mainstream – who would’ve thought multiple competing pharmaceutical companies each with drugs that would work best in combination, would work together on a clinical trial. Its happening here because we have the power!!! (ie the patients, experience and the leadership)
Other examples of new types of collaborations can include company sponsorship of academic lab activities such as preclinical studies or method validation.
Tomorrow (Wed Feb 1) on the life science twitter chat, which you can participate in by following the hashtag #ls_chat, that my friend @Comprendia and I started last year, we will be discussing collaboration in science. Some of the topics that we will be discussing include finding opportunities for academic-corporate research collaboration, determining how to make them worthwhile to both parties, and most importantly best practices for being a successful team player in such endeavors.
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Please join us tomorrow from 10-11am PT (noon CT/1pm ET) for this (hopefully!) useful discussion between academic scientists, industry scientists and others who are interested in discussing this. See you on the twitterz!
* note: I’m not speaking on behalf of my employer, just commenting on what’s happening here relating to the content of this post
