If Star Scientists do not Patent: an Event History Analysis of Scientific Eminence and the Decision to Patent in the Academic World

This paper contributes to the debate upon the trade-off between science and technology by looking at how the scientific performances of a researcher relate ex-ante to his/her attitude to patent, during his/her academic career. We run an event history analysis explaining the hazard for a scientist to become the inventor of a private-company -assigned patent as depending on publications and on personal, institutional and environmental characteristics. A striking result is that, although either productivity or quality, independently taken, are likely to increase the hazard to patent, top performers scientists, i.e. those scientists that publish a lot on highly-rated journals, are at very low risk.