Open Source Models for Development: Universities as Sources of Innovation

To meet today's pressing challenges in health, the environment and socioeconomic development, the global scientific community must implement sustained mechanisms to catalyze and connect diverse insights and approaches. Furthermore, for university researchers to fully take part in this call to action, we must dare to set institutional research agendas and to design support mechanisms that are as groundbreaking as the breakthrough technologies and approaches we aim to generate.

     The Development Impact Lab (DIL), headquartered at UC Berkeley, creates methods for universities to better source, foster and integrate development innovations. Importantly, this also includes working directly with development agencies, foundations and the private sector. This talk will draw on specific examples from DIL and others to discuss university scaling of innovations from lab bench-to-community, as well as the training of the next generation of globally-minded problem-solvers. Together, we can open up and re-define what it means to be a scientist and innovator in an interconnected world.