Technoscientific Research: A Missing Term in R&D Discourse

Over the past decade there have been consistent alarm signals about US leadership in science and technology. Arguments often boil down to the need for additional funding for R&D. In this perspective, I reflect not on the well-justified need for such additional funding, but for more effective funding, especially in technoscientific research, a key engine of innovation.

Beyond Vannevar Bush

In Cycles of Invention and Discovery: Rethinking the Endless Frontier (Harvard University Press, 2016), Tolu Odumosu and I argued that the American linear model of innovation codified after World War II—that scientific R&D is the pacesetter of engineering R&D—is faulty.

Epitomized by the great industrial R&D laboratories of the past century—places like GE, Bell Labs, IBM, Dupont, Xerox PARC—path-breaking scientific discoveries and engineering inventions go hand-in-hand, in a dance in which sometimes one leads, sometimes the other, and sometimes both occur almost simultaneously. Examples from the past abound: the transistor, the laser, and the fundamental principles of communication and information technology. Future examples can be anticipated: quantum information science and engineering, microelectronics and computing for machine learning and artificial intelligence, energy technology innovation to address climate change, and synthetic biology and biologically inspired engineering.