Introduction
Milan may be considered one of the main centers of Italian research, at least in its international and cooperative dimension, as it is demonstrated by the data regarding the Seventh Framework Programme (FP7) that Scienceonthenet have analyzed(1). From such data, the great research centers of Milan clearly stands out, especially in the fields of biomedicine, energy and information technology, but there are also hundreds of small enterprises that collaborate with partners from abroad, in a “Europe of knowledge” that is still to be fully discovered.
In this article, which represents a first draft of Scienceonthenet’s database Italian Research Map (IRM), we tried to verify with data analysis the international perspective of the research carried out in Milan(2). In order to do this, we filtered all the projects within the FP7 of the European Commission (2007-2013) that had at least one Italian partner. From this set (made up of approximately 5000 projects out of 20000) we selected all the projects that involved at least one partner from Milan at September 2013, for a total of 1061 projects.
The result is a map of the Milan-based international scientific research, which includes 240 centers, from the main universities of the city to the National Council of Resarch (CNR), from several research institutions to small enterprises that participated in one or more projects from the FP7 (see table 1).
At a first glance, it is possible to identify the high Milanese specialization in some fields such as health, energy and information technology, where institutions from Milan participate in one quarter to one third of the total projects with at least one Italian partner.
FP7 projects partecipation by field
Euratom-Fusion | 4 | 2 | 1 | 50,00% |
---|---|---|---|---|
Health | 926 | 398 | 150 | 37,69% |
Energy | 309 | 137 | 35 | 25,55% |
SSH - Socio-economic sciences and Humanities | 205 | 121 | 37 | 30,58% |
ICT - Information and communication technologies | 1943 | 956 | 238 | 24,90% |
NMP - Nanoscinces, Nanotechnologies, Materials and new Production Technologies | 694 | 411 | 92 | 22,38% |
Ideas-ERC | 3544 | 218 | 53 | 24,31% |
Euratom-Fission | 126 | 51 | 11 | 21,57% |
KBBE - Food, Agricultural and Biotecnology | 423 | 257 | 51 | 19,84% |
Environment | 418 | 220 | 42 | 19,09% |
SME - Re search for the benefit of SMEs | 795 | 326 | 62 | 19,02% |
Security | 232 | 129 | 24 | 18,60% |
Space | 210 | 98 | 20 | 20,41% |
Transport | 561 | 311 | 55 | 17,68% |
People | 9100 | 778 | 129 | 16,58% |
JTI - Joint Tecnology Iniziatives | 501 | 131 | 23 | 17,56% |
SIS - Science in society | 155 | 80 | 10 | 12,50% |
Infrastructures - Research Infrastructures | 326 | 213 | 22 | 10,33% |
Regions - Regions of Knowldge | 75 | 28 | 2 | 7,14% |
INCO - Activities of International Cooperation | 161 | 55 | 3 | 5,45% |
Regpot | 184 | 14 | 1 | 7,14% |
COH - Support for the coherent development of research policies | 24 | 2 | 0 | 0,00% |
GA | 22 | 6 | 0 | 0,00% |
Total | 20938 | 4942 | 1061 | 21,47% |
Limits and perspectives of the study
These data are still preliminary and were obtained from data supplied by the European Commission. In this first release we focused the resolution at the level of universities and research centers, without further considering the different departments (the only exception being the CNR, see table 3).
Also, we did not consider the economic aspect of the projects, neither we normalized the number of projects that each university/research center obtained for the number of researchers or other similar parameters. These will be the next steps of the IRM Project that Scienceonthenet will achieve in 2014, in order to obtain a detailed and precise picture of the protagonists of Italian research in Europe.
there is still few europe in our research
The necessity of a more transnastional profile that Italian research should acquire has been rightly stressed out: for this reason Europe promoted the ERA (European Research Area) strategy, which, through the FP7 and the recent Horizon 2020 funding programme, aims to increase efficacy and innovation of research in the continent with a real collaboration between the 28 countries of the Union(3). However, the degree of internationalization of national research is still low, both financially (7 percent of funds to different countries comes from European projects, while this amount should rise to 10 percent with Horizon 2020) and when collaborative networks are concerned, most of which are within the national borders(4) (5) (6).
a map of italian and milanese research
Going back to our dataset, in order to test the international level of scientific research carried out in Milan we cut the data at the level of the first ten institutions, classified on the basis of the number of projects, and we had some surprises: for instance, the fourth position gained by the Centro Studi Fiat. A very positive result was also obtained by the CNR, who classified first in spite of the not brilliant evaluation from ANVUR. Another relevant result is the presence, within the first ten positions, of the Politecnico and the Università degli Studi of Milan, respectively third and tenth.
Firts 10 italian contractor
Organization | Number of projects |
---|---|
Consiglio Nazionale delle Ricerche | 575 |
Alma Mater Studiorum - Università di Bologna | 201 |
Politecnico di Milano | 189 |
Centro Richerche Fiat Scpa | 162 |
La Sapienza - Università di Roma | 161 |
Politecnico di Torino | 153 |
Università degli Studi di Padova | 150 |
Agenzia nazionale per le nuove tecnologie, l’energia e lo sviluppo economico sostenibile (ENEA) | 136 |
Università degli Studi di Firenze | 121 |
Università degli Studi di Milano | 115 |
Contractors in Milan with at least 10 projects
Organization | Italy chart | Number of projects |
---|---|---|
Politecnico di Milano | 3 | 189 |
Università degli Studi di Milano | 10 | 115 |
Università Cattolica del Sacro Cuore | 24 | 59 |
Consiglio Nazionale delle Ricerche (*solo istituti di Milano) | 1 | *57 |
Ospedale San Raffaele | 30 | 56 |
Università degli Studi di Milano Bicocca | 31 | 45 |
Telecom Italia SpA | 31 | 44 |
Istituto di Ricerche Farmacologiche Mario Negri | 41 | 35 |
Università Commerciale Luigi Bocconi | 41 | 35 |
Ricerca sul Sistema Energetico - Rse Spa | 45 | 37 |
Fondazione Eni Enrico Mattei | 48 | 32 |
Istituto Europeo Di Oncologia Srl | 65 | 23 |
Txt E-solutions Spa | 69 | 20 |
Università Vita-Salute San Raffaele | 69 | 20 |
Cf Consulting Finanziamenti Unione Europea Srl | 74 | 19 |
IFOM Fondazione Istituto FIRC di Oncologia Molecolare | 79 | 18 |
Istituto Clinico Humanitas | 100 | 14 |
Istituto Nazionale dei Tumori | 105 | 13 |
Fondazione Irccs Istituto Neurologico Carlo Besta | 113 | 12 |
Fast - Federazione Delle Associazioni Scientifiche E Tecniche | 138 | 10 |
It is also interesting to analyze the Milanese contractors involved in at least 10 projects. In this rank, the main universities stand out together with the CNR and some other major player like Istituto Mario Negri, Fondazione San Raffaele, Telecom, RSE, Humanitas, Fondazione Mattei and many others.
A mark of quality is represented by the fact that, whilst Milanese contractors constitutes about the 10 percent of the total Italian amount, the number of projects that see a Milanese institutions as a participant is more than 20 percent and the average number of projects for Milanese contractors is 4.38 versus 2.40 for the others.
Partecipants/projects in media
Number of organizations | Number of projects | Media of project/organizations | |
---|---|---|---|
Italia | 2096 | 4942 | 2,36 |
Milano | 242 | 1061 | 4,38 |
Obviously, rankings change and become more informative when some of the 22 topics that were part of the FP7 are analyzed further: this allow to draw a more articular map of the contractors on the basis of health, energy, environment, information technology, nuclear energy, ideas, nanotechnology, people, infrastructure, KBBE, Jti, regions, space (see table 4).
Health
Organization | Number of projects |
---|---|
Ospedale San Raffaele | 23 |
Università degli Studi di Milano | 22 |
Istituto di Ricerche Farmacologiche Mario Negri | 20 |
Università Cattolica del Sacro Cuore | 17 |
Università Vita-Salute San Raffaele | 12 |
Università degli Studi di Milano Bicocca | 10 |
Istituto Europeo Di Oncologia Srl | 10 |
Cf Consulting Finanziamenti Unione Europea Srl | 9 |
Fondazione Irccs Istituto Neurologico Carlo Besta | 8 |
IFOM Fondazione Istituto FIRC di Oncologia Molecolare | 7 |
Istituto Nazionale dei Tumori | 6 |
Università Commerciale Luigi Bocconi | 5 |
Molecular Medicine Spa | 4 |
Istituto Clinico Humanitas | 4 |
ICT
Organization | Number of projects |
---|---|
Politecnico di Milano | 61 |
Telecom Italia SpA | 43 |
Txt E-solutions Spa | 16 |
Università degli Studi di Milano | 14 |
Consiglio Nazionale delle Ricerche | 10 |
Alcatel-lucent Italia S.P.A. | 9 |
Cefriel - Societa Consortile A Responsabilita Limitata | 8 |
Ospedale San Raffaele | 7 |
Scs Srl | 6 |
Università Cattolica del Sacro Cuore | 5 |
Cf Consulting Finanziamenti Unione Europea Srl | 5 |
Testaluna Srl | 4 |
Ricerca sul Sistema Energetico - Rse Spa | 4 |
IDEAS
Organization | Number of projects |
---|---|
Università Commerciale Luigi Bocconi | 12 |
Università degli Studi di Milano | 7 |
Politecnico di Milano | 6 |
Ospedale San Raffaele | 5 |
Istituto Europeo Di Oncologia Srl | 4 |
IFOM | 4 |
Università degli Studi di Milano Bicocca | 3 |
Istituto Clinico Humanitas | 3 |
Università Vita-Salute San Raffaele | 2 |
Ospedale San Raffaele | 2 |
Istituto di Ricerche Farmacologiche Mario Negri | 2 |
Consiglio Nazionale delle Ricerche | 2 |
Moxoff Srl-spin Off Del Politecnicodi Milano | 1 |
NMP
Organization | Number of projects |
---|---|
Consiglio Nazionale delle Ricerche | 23 |
Politecnico di Milano | 20 |
Università degli Studi di Milano Bicocca | 4 |
Txt E-solutions Spa | 4 |
Istituto di Ricerche Farmacologiche Mario Negri | 3 |
Fondazione Politecnico Di Milano | 3 |
Università degli Studi di Milano | 2 |
Università Cattolica del Sacro Cuore | 2 |
Ticonuno Srl | 2 |
Rso Spa | 2 |
IFOM | 2 |
Filarete S.R.L. | 2 |
Cestec | 2 |
international collaborations
Finally, our analysis allows to observe the network of national and international collaborations that involve Milanese research institutions, together with the cooperative subnets for each topic. A real quantitative and qualitative map of “Europe of knowledge” thus emerges, where Milan represents a key hub of the continental scientific network.
Countries whic collaborate with institutions in Milan
Milano: first outsider partners by field
Contractor | Partecipation projects | Field |
---|---|---|
Fraunhofer Gesellschaft zur Förderung angewandter Forschung e. V. | 53 | ICT |
The Chancellor, Masters, And Scholars Of The University Of Cambridge | 44 | HEALTH |
Fraunhofer Gesellschaft zur Förderung angewandter Forschung e. V. | 18 | NMP |
Joint Research Centre | 12 | ENVIRONMENT |
Centre national de la recherche scientifique | 12 | INFRASTRUCTURES |
Stichting Dienst Landbouwkundig Onderzoek | 12 | KBBE |
Deutschen Zentrums für Luft - und Raumfahrt | 10 | TRANSPORT |
Fraunhofer Gesellschaft zur Förderung angewandter Forschung e. V. | 9 | SME |
Universidad Pontificia Comillas | 8 | ENERGY |
Centro De Investigaciones Energeticas, Medioambientales Y Tecnologicas-ciemat | 8 | EURATOM-FISSION |
Centre national de la recherche scientifique | 8 | PEOPLE |
Katholieke Universiteit Leuven | 8 | SSH |
Deutschen Zentrums für Luft - und Raumfahrt | 7 | SPACE |
Commissariat à l'énergie atomique et aux énergies alternatives (CEA) | 5 | JTI |
Fraunhofer Gesellschaft zur Förderung angewandter Forschung e. V. | 5 | SECURITY |
Ecole Polytechnique Federale De Lausanne | 3 | IDEAS-ERC |
Aarhus Universitet | 3 | SIS |
Aristotelio Panepistimio Thessalonikis | 1 | EURATOM-FUSION |
Bay Zoltan Alkalmazott Kutatasi Kozhasznu Nonprofit Kft. | 1 | INCO |
Asociacion Cluster Del Sector Audiovisual De Euskadi -euskadiko Ikustentzunezko Klusterra | 1 | REGIONS |
Panepistimio Ioanninon | 1 | REGPOT |
next steps for the IRM project
Mapping the Italian research in its relationship with the rest of Europe is the aim of the Scienceonthenet project IRM that we briefly described here in its first results regarding the Milanese situation. Next steps will consist in a further increase of the resolution of our study, in order to include the level of the individual institute/department, obtain time trends, normalize data for parameters that allow detailed performance evaluations of each contractor, report European collaborative networks within proper maps and infographics to facilitate their interpretation.
Details about projects/ CNR Institutions in Milan Mi
The final aim of the IRM project is, on the one hand, to become a thermometer of the internationalization level of Italian research, thus allowing to develop enforcing strategies based on a solid knowledge of actual situation, and on the other hand a valuable set of guidelines that may help to find the “right partner” for Italian and foreigner research institutions.
Scientific research: Milan calls Europe (pdf file)
Analysis and data visualization: Sergio Cima, Emanuele Conti, Carlo Toccaceli Blasi
Developer irm.scienceonthenet.eu: Paolo Griselli
Collaborated: Michele Bellone
We wish to thank the European Commission, CORDIS and the Office for Activities and Relationships with European Institutions of the CNR for data about Milanese CNR.
Bibliography
(1) We considered the contractors located in: Assago, Bernareggio, Biassono, Bresso, Cernusco sul Naviglio, Cinisello Balsamo, Cormano, Corsico, Lainate, Milano, Opera, Rozzano, San Donato Milanese, Segrate, Settimo Milanese.
(2) Analysis are based on CORDIS data updated at September 2013 and on data supplied by the Office for Activities and Relationships with European Institutions of the CNR. CORDIS dataset contains some imprecisions that have been eliminated, but some of them could still be present. Data correction is still ongoing, any mistakes write to: [email protected]
(3) Report from the Commission to the Council and the European Parliament. European Research Area Progress Report 2013
(4) A. Chessa et al. "Is Europe Evolving Toward an Integrated research Area?", Science 8 february 2013
(5) P. Greco. La ricerca ai tempi della crisi. Scienza in rete, ottobre 2013
(6) F. Aiello. 7° Programma Quadro, i dati della partecipazione italiana. Scienza in rete, giugno 2013