A recent Nature paper has suggested ‘disruptive’ science is declining. So, what actually is disruptive science in terms of cancer research, and should we think of it as negative or positive? In other words, is it important? Do we really need ‘disruption’ at all - maybe steady iteration is more productive? Let some big picture thinking from Iain Foulkes help clarify your thoughts around all this...
Some useful links:
\"The number of science and technology research papers published has skyrocketed over the past few decades — but the ‘disruptiveness’ of those papers has dropped, according to an analysis of how radically papers depart from the previous literature\"
The Nature paper on 'disruption' - https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-022-04577-5
\"Grants, for example, often err on the side of safe bets, resulting in published research that only marginally advances existing knowledge.\"
STAT News article by Juergen Eckhardt of Leaps by Bayer and George Church at Harvard Medical School and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology - https://www.statnews.com/2023/02/01/disruptive-innovation-science-leaping-forward/
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