Abstract:

We present the international collaboration between the young researchers, the advantages, successful ventures and issues which they are facing within currently running EU project ADOPSYS in the field of optical design. There are the two most important reasons for pursuing international cooperative researches. The one is the financial savings offered by international collaboration which enable countries to maintain the breadth of their national programs, and the second even more important reason related to the goals of research is “to do the best science.” In an ideal international project, the researchers take advantage of each country’s strengths.

The international collaboration between the young researchers in ADOPSYS FP7 European project consists of:
•Trainings by ADOPSYS network events. Six network training events have to be organized in frame of the project. All young researchers have to attend all network trainings to report progress of individual research project as well to attend organized courses.
•The secondments (visiting the partner institutions) are playing very important role in connecting the researcher’s individual projects as well as doing trainings and research using the facilities of the partner laboratories.
•Networking by visiting the same conferences in organized groups.
•Publishing results of research from different project partners in same scientific papers.
•Online networking by Skype conferences, social networks, internet groups, mobile applications.

By those different kinds of events, and communication between the young researchers, the real borders made by the distance, different education, cultural background are becoming invisible.

However, the young researchers, every day are facing the new challenges, issues and visible borders which they have to get over by their self or by their team. Different national legislations, specific regimes of visas, contracts, pursuing new equipments are appearing as some of the usual issues which can make deviations in plans and change the schedules of project and planed collaborations.

We will count some of the issues which are common for international projects as well for the project ADOPSYS:
•Successful collaborations require convincing all international partners that project financing is structured fairly. Distributing costs and benefits has been a continuing and difficult problem within most of international projects.
•Intellectual property issues also complicate collaborative arrangements. In structuring a research venture, managers must decide how to acquire, use, and safeguard technologies that are necessary to the project, but proprietary to a certain firm or country.
•Sociocultural differences among researchers in the international research venture can pose obstacles to a successful collaboration. Of these, the most obvious is the difference in language. Today, English language became the essential for the fruitful collaborations and understanding between the researchers.
•Other differences in life-style, including working habits, housing, and cuisines, can also have negative effects on a researcher’s ability to feel relaxed, “at home,” and able to devote maximum mental energy to the project. Within the project Adopsys, there are 12 young researchers, originated from Asia, South America and Europe. The stress of living in a foreign culture can increase in direct proportion to the “distance” of that culture from a scientist’s own.

Keywords:

Collaboration, education, technology, researcher, research projects, optical design.