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The worldwide trend for increased collaboration between scientists may not be
such a good thing. Sylvan Katz and Ben Martin of the University of Sussex’s
Science Policy Research Unit say they have anecdotal evidence that personality
clashes, conflicts over patents and increased administration and travelling
often throw a spanner in the collaborative works. But their attempts to compare
fully the pros and cons of research collaboration were defeated by a lack of
data, says Katz in the latest issue of Research Policy (vol 26, p
1).