Using Constructive Research to Structure the Path to Transdisciplinary Innovation and Its Application for Precision Public Health with Big Data Analytics

Abstract

New approaches to complex societal challenges require a diverse mix of resources and skillsets from different disciplines to create solutions that are of a transdisciplinary innovation nature. The constructive research method enables the purposeful creation of methods, modules, tools, and techniques that have applicability well beyond the case study that motivated their creation. This research presents a bottom-up approach that follows a structured path to transdisciplinary innovation. A method is presented that demonstrates how a set of innovative research collaborations progress from disciplinary innovation to multidisciplinary innovation and ultimately onto interdisciplinary innovation. Anchored in overlapping computer science concepts, drawing on the constructive research methodology for purposeful synthesis and integration between the projects, a greater transdisciplinary goal can emerge. This method is demonstrated through a case study involving a set of big data analytics research projects involving diverse disciplines such as computer science, critical care medicine, aerospace, tactical operations, and public health. The resultant collective vision for transdisciplinary innovation that has resulted offers new approaches to maintaining individual wellness within communities across their entire lifespan on earth and in space.