Measuring Interdisciplinarity in Science

Funding agencies and policy makers in science tout the importance of interdisciplinary and transdisciplinary research -- bring together experts from multiple domains and good things happen. But what are these good things and can they be measured? Scholarly networks are a good model system for answering these questions. Looking at millions of collaborations between scientists across disciplinary and generational boundaries, we are developing metrics and algorithms that detect the ontogeny of innovative ideas and technological breakthroughs that lead to new fields and sub-fields of science