The Potential of Design in Advancing Academic Research and Entrepreneurship KEYWORDS : product design, academic entrepreneurship, science translation, collaborative prototyping The intersection between science and design is increasingly being investigated as an enabling factor in realizing the full innovation potential of scientific research. From climate change to global waste to public health, potential game-changing solutions need translational activities that turn these solutions into viable products, new materials and patient treatments. The process of translating a scientific breakthrough into a product holds numerous pitfalls, however, not least because scientists are not formally trained to envision technological applications, design products or navigate the complex network of stakeholders involved in translational processes.
Name / Surname
Stefanie Rothkötter
New approaches to overcoming these challenges can be found in an expanding academic field that examines collaboration between scientists and designers. Driver and co-workers (2012) pioneered the investigation of industrial designers' impact on scientific projects at Cambridge University. This and other initiatives like the
Research field/area
Graphic Design Help Desk of Cheng & Rolandi (2015) have given an initial validation of the need and potential
Product design and
for design in science. Yet, there are few accounts of designers in science available, as highlighted by biodesigner Sawa (2016). In existing science-oriented initiatives, the designers mostly act as external service provid-
academic entrepreneurship
ers or consultants (spatial disconnect), or work alongside scientists but on a design project that has no direct relevance to the academic research (thematic disconnect).
Supervisor
My PhD research goes towards closing this gap by connecting scientists with designers both spatially and the-
Prof. Sándor Vajna Prof. Craig C. Garner
matically. The practical part of the investigation consists in action research as a temporary member of academic groups predominantly within the life sciences. Insights are distilled from case studies of co-design projects that are undertaken with academic inventors over the course of several weeks to months and documented using mixed media. In this exploration of the path from an idea to a product, there are three areas of interest to be analyzed in detail (Figure 1).
yr1
yr2
yr3
yr4
yr5
Which insights can be gained through immersion
Which impact does collaborative prototyping
of the designer in the research environment of an
have on participants’ creative confidence?
academic invention?
How can design activities advance aspects of academic entrepreneurship such as business model development?
Figure 1: Fields of exploration
Bibliography Cheng, K. & Rolandi, M. (2015): Graphic Design for Scientists. In: Nature Nanotechnology 10 (12), p. 1084. Driver, A., Peralta, C., & Moultrie, J. (2012): Exploring How Industrial Designers Can Contribute to Scientific Research. Institute of Manufacturing, University of Cambridge. Sawa, M. (2016): The Laboratory Life of a Designer at the Intersection with Algal Biotechnology. In: Arq 20 (01), p. 65–72.