Region
North America
971 entries tagged North America.
Articles — 956
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Enhancing Rural Innovation in Canada
OECD Rural Studies report examining Canada's rural innovation ecosystem — the actors, funding flows, and policy levers that shape innovation in rural and remote regions, with comparative international benchmarks. Verify exact publication year on the cover.
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Identifying and Responding to the Challenges of Sustaining a Tuition Support Program in a Rural Setting
Identifies challenges in sustaining a rural tuition support program and offers responses for community-based education programs working with limited resources in rural Canada.
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Engaging Community Colleges in Rural Development: A Meta-Synthesis of Doctoral Dissertations
Meta-synthesis of 20 doctoral dissertations (2009-2020) on the role of community colleges in rural community, economic, and workforce development, surfacing recurring themes and a research agenda for rural-serving institutions.
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Spanning Boundaries and Transforming Roles: Broadening Extension's Reach With OSU Open Campus and Juntos
Documents Oregon State University's Open Campus and Juntos pilot — placing 'boundary-spanning' Extension agents in rural communities to bridge cultural, institutional, and content-area silos, expanding access to higher education and broadband for Latinx and rural families.
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Campus in the Country: Community College Involvement in Rural Community Development
Examines community-college involvement in rural community development in Canada, drawing on field research to characterise the roles colleges play as innovation and education anchors in rural areas.
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A Primer on Innovation, Learning, and Knowledge Flows
Working paper from Memorial University connecting New Regionalism, knowledge flows, and learning to rural and regional economic development. Frames the region as the locus where competitive advantage is distilled from social and institutional assets.
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Definitions of "Rural"
Foundational Statistics Canada working paper unpacking the multiple operational definitions of 'rural' used in policy and research — by density, by distance to density, by commuting, and by administrative boundary. Essential reading for anyone using rural data.
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Indigenous Cultural Heritage Policies & Local Planning — A Case Study in the Land of Plenty
Master of Resource Management project examining how Indigenous cultural heritage policies intersect with local planning practice, using a place-based case study to surface implementation gaps and possibilities.
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Applicability of Territorial Innovation Models to Declining Resource-Based Regions: Lessons from the Northern Peninsula of Newfoundland
Tests how well established territorial innovation models (regional innovation systems, learning regions, etc.) travel to declining resource-based rural regions, using Newfoundland's Northern Peninsula as the case.
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Regional Innovation Systems in the Periphery: The Case of the Beauce in Québec (Canada)
Survey-based study of 45 SMEs in the Beauce region of Quebec asking how innovation actually happens in a peripheral regional innovation system, where actors are less diversified than in oft-cited core regions like Silicon Valley or Emilia-Romagna.
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A Tour of Rural Data in Statistics Canada
Background notes for a CRRF webinar walking through how Statistics Canada classifies rural geographies (density, distance, administrative boundary) and where to find rural data. Companion piece to du Plessis et al. 2002.
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Automated pastures and the digital divide: How agricultural technologies are shaping labour and rural communities
Agricultural digitalization in North America, particularly Canada, is reshaping farm labour and rural communities through automation, sensors, and artificial intelligence. The paper identifies three critical tensions: rising land costs paired with automation reducing labour demand, creation of a bifurcated labour market with few high-skill and many low-skill jobs, and corporate control of farm data. Using a social justice lens, the authors argue that digital technologies intensify exploitation of marginalized agricultural workers and deepen rural inequality, calling for policy and research to redirect digitalization toward supporting both food production and vulnerable farm labourers.
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Beyond agricultural innovation systems? Exploring an agricultural innovation ecosystems approach for niche design and development in sustainability transitions
This paper argues that agricultural innovation systems need to adopt an ecosystems approach to better support sustainability transitions. The authors show that innovation ecosystems thinking enhances traditional approaches by emphasizing power dynamics, including diverse actors and ecological factors, and enabling cross-sector collaboration. This framework enables design of transboundary innovation niches that support sustainable agriculture across multiple scales and paradigms.
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Twenty Years of Rural Entrepreneurship: A Bibliometric Survey
This bibliometric analysis of 181 articles on rural entrepreneurship reveals the field remains underdeveloped theoretically despite growing research interest. Rural entrepreneurship research concentrates in Europe, particularly the UK and Spain, and focuses on organizational characteristics, policy, and governance. Empirical work emphasizes developed nations like the UK, USA, and Finland. The authors argue that weak theoretical foundations limit the field's progress and call for expanded research in less developed countries where rural entrepreneurship holds significant potential.
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The Rural-Urban Digital Divide
This study analyzed national survey data to examine whether the digital divide between rural and urban populations was growing. Income, age, and education proved stronger predictors of technology use than geographic location. The association between these status indicators and technology adoption strengthened over time. The research concludes that information technology benefits will remain concentrated among higher-income, educated, younger populations rather than spreading universally.
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Disparities in Technology and Broadband Internet Access Across Rurality
Rural school districts in Washington State have significantly lower technology and broadband access than urban districts. Only 80% of rural students had adequate internet-enabled devices for online learning, compared to 90% in urban areas. Rural youth face greater barriers including geographic isolation, affordability, and reliance on smartphones. These disparities limit access to telehealth and remote education in rural communities.
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Rural entrepreneurship in place: an integrated framework
Rural entrepreneurship requires a different analytical approach than agglomeration-based theories used in urban contexts. The authors develop a place-sensitive framework that identifies the specific conditions enabling entrepreneurship in rural communities. This meso-level framework helps policymakers and researchers understand rural entrepreneurial places holistically, moving beyond generic ecosystem models to address the distinct characteristics of rural contexts.
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Agriculture in the developing world: Connecting innovations in plant research to downstream applications
Plant genomics and molecular breeding offer powerful tools to improve crops for poor farmers in developing regions. The paper argues that translating these innovations into real benefits requires better collaboration between public and private plant scientists, new funding mechanisms, and targeted research on abiotic and biotic stresses. While private companies have successfully developed improved maize and cotton varieties, the public sector must build capacity to apply these same techniques to crops serving the poorest farmers.
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Smart Farming: Including Rights Holders for Responsible Agricultural Innovation
Agricultural innovation embeds values and shapes social relationships, not just technical problems. The paper argues that innovation design and governance must include diverse rights holders and stakeholders to ensure responsible development. Treating innovation as purely technical work ignores how farming technologies reorder social and environmental systems, requiring broader participation in decision-making.
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Navigating the Digital Divide: Barriers to Telehealth in Rural Areas
Telehealth can expand healthcare access in rural areas, but structural barriers prevent widespread adoption where it's needed most. The paper identifies three critical obstacles: inadequate broadband infrastructure, lack of interstate medical licensing agreements, and absence of reimbursement parity laws. Rural populations, racial minorities, elderly people, and those with low education face the steepest disparities. The authors map broadband availability and state policy adoption across the country and recommend policy changes to accelerate rural telehealth implementation.
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Opening design and innovation processes in agriculture: Insights from design and management sciences and future directions
Agricultural innovation requires more open, participatory design processes that move beyond traditional approaches. This paper synthesizes research on co-design and co-innovation in agriculture, drawing insights from management and design sciences. It identifies three priorities: expanding design tools to engage multiple senses, opening innovation networks to support sustainability transitions while addressing power dynamics, and including non-human actors like materials and ecosystems in innovation processes.
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Organic Farmer Networks: Facilitating Learning and Innovation for Sustainable Agriculture
Organic farmer networks in northeastern New York State drive agricultural innovation through social learning and participatory problem-solving. The study shows how farmers learn from each other and adopt sustainable practices within these networks. The research identifies opportunities for agricultural extension services to support organic farmer management by leveraging these existing social learning processes.
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Broadband Internet and New Firm Location Decisions in Rural Areas
Broadband deployment significantly increases where new firms choose to locate in rural areas. Using a difference-in-differences approach that controls for location-specific factors, the researchers found that broadband availability positively influences new firm entry decisions. The effect is strongest in more densely populated rural areas and those near metropolitan regions, indicating that broadband's impact on firm location grows stronger where agglomeration economies are present.
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Infrastructure Investment and Rural Economic Development: An Evaluation of USDA's Broadband Loan Program
The USDA's Broadband Loan Program, launched in 2002, significantly boosted employment, payroll, and business establishments in recipient communities during its pilot phase (2002–2003). However, benefits concentrated in rural areas near cities. The newer program phase showed no measurable economic impact yet, likely due to insufficient time for effects to materialize.
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Agricultural Innovation Systems: An Investment Sourcebook
This World Bank reference guide explains agricultural innovation systems and their key components. It emphasizes that successful systems require collaboration through national coordination, innovation networks, market access, and farmer organization capacity. Agricultural education and training are critical for building human resources that enable these systems to function effectively.
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Subdividing the Digital Divide: Differences in Internet Access and Use among Rural Residents with Medical Limitations
Rural residents and people with medical conditions use the Internet far less than urban residents and those without medical limitations. The study found that 32.6% of people with medical conditions used the Internet compared to 70.3% without conditions, and rural Internet use was 59.7% versus 69.4% urban. Racial disparities persisted even after controlling for demographics, with Hispanic and African American respondents showing significantly lower Internet use than white respondents. The rural-urban gap disappeared when accounting for socioeconomic factors.
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Food and agricultural innovation pathways for prosperity
Agricultural research investments can reduce poverty and improve rural prosperity through multiple pathways affecting farmers, laborers, value chain actors, and urban poor. The authors identify 18 plausible impact mechanisms linking agricultural research to poverty reduction outcomes and examine how urbanization and climate change reshape development contexts in low-income countries. They emphasize that measuring success requires understanding who benefits and loses, incorporating gender equity and nuanced definitions of prosperity beyond income metrics.
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The Possibility of Place: One Teacher's Use of Place-Based Instruction for English Students in a Rural High School
A teacher in a rural high school used place-based instruction to teach eighth-grade English, connecting lessons to students' local communities and experiences. When the teacher grounded instruction in place-based content rather than personal anecdotes, students developed their own understanding of place. While place-based strategies increased curricular relevance, the study warns that without critical analysis, rural students may struggle to interpret structural inequalities affecting their communities. The research recommends integrating critical pedagogy into place-based English instruction.
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Agricultural Extension, Collective Action and Innovation Systems: Lessons on Network Brokering from Peru and Mexico
Extension services in Peru and Mexico show that fostering agricultural innovation requires more than collective action alone. Peru's approach, using NGO brokers and trusted local farmers called Kamayoq, successfully built innovation networks among diverse value chain actors. Mexico's linear seed-transfer model created collective action but no innovation networks. The research concludes that extension must combine collective action with active networking to shift from technology transfer toward genuine agricultural innovation systems.
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Assessing or Predicting Adoption of Telehealth Using the Diffusion of Innovations Theory: A Practical Example from a Rural Program in New Mexico
A rural telemedicine program in New Mexico used diffusion of innovations theory to understand why healthcare providers adopt or reject telehealth. The researchers found that the type of innovation decision—whether adoption is made individually, collectively, or by authority—significantly influences whether telehealth gets adopted. They demonstrate that diffusion theory effectively evaluates telehealth programs and propose developing a predictive tool to assess adoption likelihood before new programs launch.
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Government Interventions to Promote Agricultural Innovation
Government interventions can effectively promote agricultural innovation by reducing farmers' adoption barriers and encouraging technology uptake. The paper analyzes how subsidies, information programs, and other policy tools influence farmers' decisions to adopt new practices. Strategic government support accelerates innovation diffusion and helps farmers improve productivity while reducing environmental impact.
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Place-Based Resentment in Contemporary U.S. Elections: The Individual Sources of America’s Urban-Rural Divide
Rural Americans harbor significant resentment toward urban communities, and this place-based animosity strongly predicts voting behavior in U.S. elections. The researchers analyzed survey data from 2018 to 2020 and found that rural resentment was a powerful predictor of vote choice in both the 2018 midterm and 2020 general elections, independent of partisanship and racial attitudes. The findings explain a key driver of America's urban-rural political divide.
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Innovation, Cooperation, and the Perceived Benefits and Costs of Sustainable Agriculture Practices
Farmers' adoption of sustainable agriculture practices depends on their perceptions of benefits and costs, shaped by social networks and cooperation. The study shows that innovation spreads through farmer networks, and perceived advantages—environmental, economic, or social—drive adoption decisions. Cooperation among farmers strengthens commitment to sustainable methods, while perceived costs and risks create barriers to change.
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Innovations in Climate Risk Management: Protecting and Building Rural Livelihoods in a Variable and Changing Climate
Rural farmers face climate risks from both extreme weather and missed opportunities in favorable years. The paper argues that effective climate risk management combines three innovations: rural climate information services that help farmers make production decisions, decision support systems that translate climate data into actionable institutional guidance, and index-based insurance and credit products that protect livelihoods and enable technology adoption. These approaches together address immediate poverty while building long-term climate resilience.
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Rural broadband speeds and business startup rates
Using county-level data from 2014, this study examines how broadband speeds affect rural business startup rates across different industries. The researchers find that broadband coverage significantly influences startup activity, with download speeds mattering more than upload speeds. Mobile broadband also plays a role. Importantly, the impact varies by industry type—what drives startups in one sector may not apply to another. The findings confirm that broadband access is increasingly critical for rural entrepreneurship.
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Sustainable Rural Telehealth Innovation: A Public Health Case Study
This case study of Georgia's largest public health district from 1988 to 2008 shows how telehealth became sustainable in rural areas. Strong collaboration within the district, with local communities, and external partners drove adoption. Local champions overcame barriers by seizing technological and financial opportunities. External funding supported initial implementation and expansion. The combination of internal collaboration, external partnerships, and opportunistic use of available resources enabled lasting telehealth innovation.
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Rural Schools and the Digital Divide
Rural teachers use various educational technology tools but lack formal training, relying instead on trial and error to learn new systems. Budget constraints emerge as the primary barrier to technology adoption, followed by students' limited home internet access. Teachers hold mixed views on technology effectiveness. The study recommends strategies for administrators and educators to better integrate appropriate tools and improve student learning outcomes.
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Microbiome Innovation in Agriculture: Development of Microbial Based Tools for Insect Pest Management
This review examines how microbes can improve sustainable pest management in agriculture. The authors explain how insect-microbe relationships affect pest nutrition, immunity, and pesticide resistance, then describe methods to manipulate microbiomes to alter pest traits. They identify microbiomes as sources for discovering new biopesticides and show how beneficial microbes enhance mass-reared insects used in sterile insect and incompatible insect control techniques.
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Making Agricultural Innovation Systems (AIS) Work for Development in Tropical Countries
Agricultural innovation systems in tropical low-income countries struggle because capacity development initiatives don't align with national efforts. A study of Southeast Asia, Sub-Saharan Africa, and Central America found that external programs focus on training individuals, while countries actually need institutional strengthening. The research recommends improving south-south collaboration and building institutional capacity to make national agricultural innovation systems more responsive to smallholder farmers' needs.
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Does Directed Innovation Mitigate Climate Damage? Evidence from U.S. Agriculture
Innovation in U.S. agriculture has shifted toward crops increasingly exposed to extreme temperatures since the mid-twentieth century, driven by adaptation-focused technologies. This directed innovation significantly reduces economic damage from temperature extremes at the county level. The authors estimate that innovation has offset 20% of potential agricultural land value losses from climate trends since 1960 and could offset 13% of projected damage by 2100, demonstrating that technological adaptation provides meaningful but incomplete protection against climate change.
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Innovation, cooperation, and the structure of three regional sustainable agriculture networks in California
Wine grape growers in three California regions form networks that support sustainability through multiple mechanisms: central actors diffuse innovations, closed triangles solve cooperation problems, and boundary-spanning ties connect specialized system components. Network structures vary by region based on geography and institutional history, affecting capacity to respond to environmental change.
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Measuring Women’s Empowerment in Agriculture: Innovations and evidence
This paper reviews how women's empowerment in agriculture is measured and what interventions actually work. The authors use the Women's Empowerment in Agriculture Index to analyze 11 agricultural development projects and livestock interventions. They find evidence linking women's empowerment to improved agricultural productivity, incomes, and food security. The paper offers recommendations for better measurement approaches and policy design.
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Impact of agricultural innovation adoption: a meta‐analysis
This meta-analysis of 154 studies examines how agricultural innovation adoption affects production and economic outcomes. Results show reported impacts increase over time, though publication bias exists. Study findings depend on research design, statistical methods, and region. The literature heavily favors high-yielding variety innovations while neglecting complementary technologies.
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Organizational Path Constitution in Technological Innovation: Evidence from Rural Telehealth1
This paper develops a theory of how technological innovation paths form within organizations, using a rural telehealth case study. It combines path dependence (historical constraints) with path creation (deliberate actor choices) to explain how organizations transform innovation patterns, merge or separate paths, and sometimes become locked into dominant patterns they struggle to escape.
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INNOVATION PLATFORMS IN AGRICULTURAL RESEARCH FOR DEVELOPMENT
Innovation platforms bring together agricultural stakeholders to learn, negotiate, and solve development challenges collaboratively. However, this study warns they are not universally applicable. The authors provide a decision-support tool for agencies to critically assess when innovation platforms are genuinely needed versus when simpler, cheaper alternatives exist. The tool helps determine what resources and conditions are necessary for platforms to succeed in achieving agricultural development outcomes.
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Understanding Smallholder Farmers’ Intention to Adopt Agricultural Apps: The Role of Mastery Approach and Innovation Hubs in Mexico
Mexican smallholder farmers' willingness to adopt agricultural advice apps depends primarily on their assessment of technical infrastructure and ability to learn through the app. Performance expectations drive adoption across all farmers. Mastery-approach goals matter only for younger farmers and those outside innovation hubs. Innovation hubs reduce the importance of learning motivation, suggesting they provide alternative knowledge pathways for adoption decisions.
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Community Matters: Successful Entrepreneurship in Remote Rural US Locations
Rural entrepreneurs in remote US towns succeed more when motivated by family income and flexibility rather than wealth or personal challenge. Entrepreneurs in communities with strong bridging social capital—networks connecting diverse groups—perform better because these connections help retain skilled workers, reduce costs, access capital, and build customer loyalty. Community characteristics matter more than general rural disadvantages in explaining entrepreneurial success.
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The Increasing Multifunctionality of Agricultural Raw Materials: Three Dilemmas for Innovation and Adoption
Agricultural raw materials now serve multiple industries beyond food and fiber, including energy, chemicals, and pharmaceuticals. This expansion creates three critical challenges: competing goals among different sectors, competition between established and new companies, and blurred industry boundaries. The paper reviews innovation and adoption research in the bioeconomy and proposes conceptual frameworks to address these dilemmas.
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Evaluating U.S. Rural Entrepreneurship Policy
This paper examines how entrepreneurship drives rural economic growth in the United States, distinguishing between necessity-driven and opportunity-driven entrepreneurship. The authors model knowledge accumulation through scientific investment and patents, review existing evaluations of U.S. entrepreneurship promotion programs, and identify significant data limitations that hinder rigorous assessment. They outline methodological standards for conducting ideal evaluations of rural entrepreneurship policies.
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Technological innovations in agriculture: the application of Blockchain and Artificial Intelligence for grain traceability and protection
Blockchain and artificial intelligence technologies are transforming grain agriculture by creating transparent, immutable supply chain records and enabling AI-driven risk prediction and dynamic insurance contracts. Smart contracts automate financing based on preset conditions, improving grain quality, preventing fraud, and optimizing logistics. Together, these technologies build more sustainable and resilient agricultural systems that address climate change, price volatility, and supply chain transparency demands.
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Broadband adoption and availability: Impacts on rural employment during COVID-19
During COVID-19 lockdowns in April and May 2020, rural U.S. counties with higher broadband availability and wired broadband adoption rates experienced significantly higher employment rates. Using two-stage least squares analysis while controlling for socioeconomic and demographic factors, the authors demonstrate that both broadband infrastructure and household adoption directly supported rural employment when work moved online.
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Telehealth, Rural America, and the Digital Divide
Rural America faces significant barriers to telehealth adoption due to the digital divide. Limited broadband access, inadequate infrastructure, and connectivity gaps prevent rural patients and providers from effectively using remote healthcare technologies. The paper examines how these digital inequities undermine telehealth's potential to address rural healthcare shortages and improve access to medical services in underserved communities.
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Happy to Be Home: Place-Based Attachments, Family Ties, and Mobility among Rural Stayers
Rural Vermonters who choose to stay in their home state do so primarily because of place attachment and family proximity. The study reveals that contented stayers value landscape, community, and living near relatives. Beyond simple immobility, these residents actively exercise diverse forms of mobility—travel and engagement—while maintaining their commitment to home. The research shifts focus from migration patterns to understanding why people remain rooted in rural places.
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Innovations for a Shrinking Agricultural Workforce
The paper examines how agricultural businesses adopt labor-saving technologies in response to a shrinking workforce. It argues that investment in new farm technologies must account for long-term labor supply decline in the U.S. and rising education levels in traditional agricultural worker regions, requiring strategic planning for a smaller but more educated workforce.
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Innovation in urban agricultural practices: Responding to diverse production environments
Urban farms in seven US cities develop distinct innovations to overcome space constraints, limited land access, and non-traditional growing conditions. These operations prioritize community and social missions alongside food production, creating unique production systems unlike rural agriculture. The study identifies how local environmental factors and food system structures drive farms to adopt space-intensive techniques across diverse business models, from parking lots to warehouses, and highlights major ongoing challenges facing urban agriculture.
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DIGITAL ENTREPRENEURSHIP SOLUTION TO RURAL POVERTY: THEORY, PRACTICE AND POLICY IMPLICATIONS
Digital entrepreneurship can reduce rural poverty by addressing structural barriers and improving rural entrepreneurs' financial outcomes. The paper develops a framework linking digital ecosystems to poverty reduction, examining how local government policies enable or hinder this process. Case studies reveal tensions between market forces, technology adoption, business viability, and government support in developing economies, with implications for rural development policy.
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Crossing the digital divide: cost-effective broadband wireless access for rural and remote areas
This paper examines how WiFi technology can deliver affordable broadband to rural and remote areas where service is expensive or unavailable. The authors model wireless networks using 802.11b with realistic costs, demand, and revenue data across different settlement patterns. They evaluate emerging technologies like high-gain antennas and multihop routing. Results demonstrate that cost-effective high-speed internet access is economically viable in rural regions through innovative wireless approaches.
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Digital agriculture platforms: Driving data‐enabled agricultural innovation in a world fraught with privacy and security concerns
Digital agriculture platforms enable data sharing and collaboration across agricultural value chains, but face significant challenges around data quality, privacy, and intellectual property. This paper develops a taxonomy of the digital agriculture landscape and analyzes platforms against technical and use requirements, establishing a common vocabulary for understanding how these systems support data-enabled agricultural innovation.
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Evaluating the impact of broadband access and internet use in a small underserved rural community
A wireless broadband network deployed in a rural Missouri community produced mixed results. While the intervention didn't directly increase internet use for employment, education, or health, it did enable households to use multiple devices simultaneously. The study highlights that broadband benefits in underserved areas differ from unserved ones, and offers practical guidance for designing future broadband evaluation studies.
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Understanding inclusive innovation processes in agricultural systems: A middle-range conceptual model
This paper develops a middle-range theory explaining how inclusive innovation works in smallholder agricultural systems across the Global South. By analyzing three cases from South America, Southeast Asia, and Africa, the author identifies a consistent pattern: initial activities alter local context, triggering social learning, social capital strengthening, and consensus formation. These mechanisms drive technical, organizational, and institutional innovation. The model provides practitioners and researchers with a framework for understanding, facilitating, and evaluating inclusive agricultural innovation processes.
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The Unseen Digital Divide: Urban, Suburban, and Rural Teacher Use and Perceptions of Web-Based Classroom Technologies
A survey of 2,200 teachers across rural, suburban, and urban schools in a Mid-Atlantic state found significant differences in technology use and perceived effectiveness of web-based classroom tools. Urban teachers used and perceived web-based technologies as less effective than their suburban and rural counterparts. Suburban teachers rated technology effectiveness highest, followed by rural teachers. The findings suggest urban schools need targeted support to improve technology integration.
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Induced Innovation in United States Agriculture, 1880–1990: Time Series Tests and an Error Correction Model
This paper tests the induced innovation hypothesis in U.S. agriculture from 1880 to 1990 using an error correction model. The analysis confirms that changes in factor prices and research spending drive technological change that saves expensive inputs. The study separates factor substitution from technological bias, establishing that price signals and R&D investment causally precede the development of labor-saving and land-saving innovations in American agriculture.
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Social Media for Enhancing Innovation in Agri-food and Rural Development: Current Dynamics in Ontario, Canada
Social media adoption in Ontario's agri-food and rural sectors remains in early stages with significant barriers. Analysis of 50 online communities reveals that farmers, entrepreneurs, scientists, and rural workers struggle to collaborate effectively on Web 2.0 platforms. Key obstacles include feedback gaps, conflicting stakeholder views on credibility and risk, and insufficient capacity to develop appropriate applications. The paper concludes that user-oriented, autonomous social media tools are essential for enabling genuine innovation in rural systems.
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Place-based policy and rural poverty: insights from the urban spatial mismatch literature
Rural poverty persists partly because geographic distance creates barriers to economic adjustment, similar to spatial mismatch in cities. Using US data, the authors show that remoteness correlates with higher poverty rates and that poor people don't simply choose to live in isolated areas. Labor supply responses confirm these distance-based frictions matter. The findings support place-based anti-poverty policies rather than focusing solely on helping poor individuals relocate.
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A research agenda for evaluating living labs as an open innovation model for environmental and agricultural sustainability
Living labs—collaborative spaces where stakeholders co-create and test innovations in real-world settings—show promise for addressing environmental and agricultural challenges. This paper presents a research agenda developed through expert consultation to identify gaps in how living labs are evaluated and made effective. The authors find that living labs remain underutilized in environmental and agricultural sectors and call for better understanding of stakeholder diversity, evaluation methods, and conditions that enable their success.
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Rural Entrepreneurship Success Factors: An Empirical Investigation in an Emerging Market
This study identifies key factors distinguishing successful from failed small businesses in rural emerging markets. Using logistic regression on 230 rural businesses, the researchers found that capital, industry experience, staffing, and marketing skills most significantly predict success. The Lussier prediction model achieved 71% accuracy, validating its use across both advanced and developing economies and providing practical guidance for rural entrepreneurs, policymakers, and financial institutions.
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Innovation systems and technical efficiency in developing‐country agriculture
This study analyzes how agricultural innovation systems affect technical efficiency across 85 developing countries from 2004 to 2011. Mobile phone subscriptions and scientific research output both improve agricultural production efficiency. Countries in the lower technological class achieve 44% efficiency compared to 62% in the higher class, revealing substantial room for productivity gains through efficiency-focused investments in innovation infrastructure.
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Innovations on a shoestring: a study of a collaborative community-based Aboriginal mental health service model in rural Canada
A mental health team in northern Ontario developed an innovative collaborative model integrating clinical approaches with traditional Aboriginal healing. Despite severe resource constraints, the Knaw Chi Ge Win service improved care quality and cultural safety for Aboriginal clients. The model succeeded through shared information systems, protocols, and ongoing education. Challenges remain around chronic underfunding and limited understanding of traditional healing outcomes. This approach offers a replicable model for other rural Indigenous mental health systems.
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An Interactional Approach to Place-Based Rural Development
Rural America faces unprecedented economic transformation from globalization, eliminating traditional employment sources. Traditional rural development policies have become ineffective. The authors argue that place-based competitiveness strategies alone fall short and propose an interactional approach that simultaneously addresses economic, environmental, and social well-being as integrated components of rural development.
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Innovations in Modern Nanotechnology for the Sustainable Production of Agriculture
Nanotechnology offers sustainable solutions for agriculture by enabling targeted delivery of nutrients, pesticides, and fungicides through nanomaterials. These innovations address crop losses from pests, disease, and poor soil quality while reducing environmental damage from conventional farming. Nanoparticles improve plant growth, crop quality and yield, and disease management to meet growing global food demand.
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Urban/Rural Digital Divide Exists in Older Adults: Does It Vary by Racial/Ethnic Groups?
Older Americans in rural areas use the internet significantly less than urban counterparts, and this gap is worse for Black and Hispanic seniors. Using data from 17,372 Americans aged 50+, the study found that rural residence and racial/ethnic minority status both independently reduce internet use. Rural living creates an especially severe digital divide for older Black Americans compared to older White Americans, indicating that targeted interventions must address the compounded barriers facing rural minority seniors.
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Entrepreneurship, Broadband, and Gender: Evidence from Establishment Births in Rural America
Broadband access significantly increases business formation rates in rural America, with the strongest effects on nonemployer businesses, women-led enterprises, and remote establishments. The study uses instrumental variable methods to show that broadband enables rural entrepreneurs—particularly women—to reach nontraditional markets without physical storefronts, overcoming the constraints of thin local markets.
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Place-Based Stewardship Education: Nurturing Aspirations to Protect the Rural Commons
Place-based stewardship education in rural Michigan schools significantly increased middle school students' environmental sensitivity, responsible behaviors, community attachment, and civic confidence. Students developed stronger identification with their communities and commitment to protecting local natural resources. The program successfully linked classroom learning to collective environmental action, expanding students' aspirations to contribute meaningfully to their communities' futures.
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Appreciating the Contribution of Broadband ICT With Rural and Remote Communities: Stepping Stones Toward an Alternative Paradigm
Conventional broadband policy evaluation in rural areas focuses narrowly on measurable short-term outcomes, missing how ICT actually contributes to economic, social, and cultural wellbeing. This paper proposes an alternative approach treating broadband projects as learning experiments within sociotechnical systems. It emphasizes stakeholder engagement, adaptive policymaking, and letting communities define their own impact indicators rather than imposing predetermined measures.
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In pursuit of responsible innovation for precision agriculture technologies
Agricultural decision support systems using satellite data, drones, and machine learning reshape how farms operate, but create uneven benefits and risks. Research with farmers in Vermont and South Dakota reveals these technologies transform knowledge production, change labor arrangements, and distribute advantages unevenly. Developers must adopt inclusive deliberative processes when designing these systems to ensure ethical, equitable, and sustainable outcomes.
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Making room for manoeuvre: addressing gender norms to strengthen the enabling environment for agricultural innovation
Gender norms significantly shape whether agricultural innovation succeeds or fails at the local level, yet development research has largely overlooked them. Drawing on the GENNOVATE research initiative, the authors show that gender norms interact with individual agency to determine agricultural outcomes. Effective agricultural development requires explicitly addressing these norms and challenging underlying inequality structures, not just focusing on policies, markets, and institutions.
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The Contribution of Private Industry to Agricultural Innovation
Private-sector agricultural research and development spending increased 43 percent between 1994 and 2010, driven primarily by advances in seed biotechnology. This growth demonstrates the significant role that private industry plays in funding and developing agricultural innovations.
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The Diffusion of Internet Technologies to Rural Communities: A Portrait of Broadband Supply and Demand
Rural Oklahoma communities face persistent digital divides driven primarily by demand-side factors rather than infrastructure gaps. While telecommunications companies underinvest in rural areas due to low population density, the study finds that infrastructure availability contributes only minimally to broadband access disparities. However, infrastructure's importance grows as Internet knowledge spreads, suggesting that supply-side investments become more critical as rural demand increases.
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Climate, insurance and innovation: the case of drought and innovations in drought-tolerant traits in US agriculture
Crop insurance in US agriculture reduces innovation in drought-tolerant traits by approximately 23 percent, despite farmers increasing innovation activities in response to climate variation. Subsidized insurance weakens this adaptive response, potentially undermining long-term agricultural resilience to climate change by discouraging the development of climate-adapted crops.
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Agricultural Innovations for Sustainable Crop Production Intensification
Sustainable crop production intensification requires linking farmers' local knowledge with science-based innovations through institutional arrangements. The paper reviews agronomic practices supporting sustainable systems, including crop selection, ecosystem-based farming, pest management, nutrient management, and irrigation technologies. It proposes seven contextual changes that demand examination of how agricultural innovation occurs and spreads to farm level.
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THE DIGITAL DIVIDE AND RURAL COMMUNITY COLLEGES: PROBLEMS AND PROSPECTS
Rural America faces a persistent and widening digital divide, with lower rates of telephone, computer, and internet access compared to urban areas. This gap affects nearly all demographic groups—single parents, elderly and young people, minorities, people with disabilities, and lower-income households. The article examines four national reports documenting these disparities and discusses how the divide impacts rural community college students, educators, administrators, and policy decisions.
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Intellectual Property Rights and the Ascent of Proprietary Innovation in Agriculture
Agricultural biological innovations historically lacked formal intellectual property protection, but recent decades have seen substantial strengthening of these rights. This paper documents how plant IPRs have evolved, examines economic theory on their effects, and reviews empirical evidence on innovation outcomes. The authors show how agricultural IPR experience aligns with or diverges from broader IPR literature, and discuss implications for market structure and input pricing.
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Global investment gap in agricultural research and innovation to meet Sustainable Development Goals for hunger and Paris Agreement climate change mitigation
Agricultural research and development investments must increase by $4 billion annually, plus $6.5 billion yearly for climate-smart farming technologies, to end global hunger by 2030 and meet Paris Agreement climate targets. The analysis models how conservation tillage, improved nitrogen use, better livestock management, and other sustainable practices reduce greenhouse gas emissions while cutting hunger to 5% worldwide.
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Entrepreneurship and Small Business Development as a Rural Development Strategy
Small business development and entrepreneurship support can combat rural poverty and strengthen local economies. The authors examine the USDA 1890 Entrepreneurial Outreach Initiative as a community-based strategy to spur economic growth in rural Southern communities. They argue that locally-controlled enterprises are critical for determining whether rural communities prosper or decline, and that microenterprise programs represent an important development approach.
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Using diffusion of innovations theory to understand agricultural producer perspectives on cover cropping in the inland Pacific Northwest, USA
Farmers in the inland Pacific Northwest resist adopting cover crops despite research showing benefits. Using diffusion of innovations theory, interviews with 28 producers revealed that low perceived profitability, incompatibility with existing systems, and complexity of experimentation deter adoption. Focus groups with 48 stakeholders identified opportunities to improve adoption by providing region-specific agronomic and economic data, aligning policies with producer goals, and tailoring outreach to local conditions.
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Rural Entrepreneurship in a Time of Recession
Rural Americans shifted from opportunity-driven to necessity-driven entrepreneurship during the 2008–2010 recession. Before the downturn, rural residents started businesses at higher rates than urban counterparts, particularly when employment grew. The recession reversed this pattern, with rural entrepreneurs increasingly driven by economic need rather than opportunity. College education predicted opportunity entrepreneurship, while low income and part-time work predicted necessity entrepreneurship across rural counties.
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Rural Community Participation, Social Networks, and Broadband Use: Examples from Localized and National Survey Data
Broadband access independently increases volunteering in rural communities, separate from the effects of social network size. The study analyzed three datasets to examine how internet connectivity influences community participation, which is particularly vital in rural areas. Results show broadband and social networks operate as distinct factors driving rural civic engagement.
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Barriers to the Adoption of Innovations for Sustainable Development in the Agricultural Sector—Systematic Literature Review (SLR)
This systematic review of 48 scientific articles identifies 51 barriers preventing agricultural innovation for sustainability. The most common obstacles are lack of supportive policies, epistemic closure, unfavorable regulations, and unskilled labor. External barriers (28) outnumber internal ones (23), with organic agriculture, genetic engineering, and precision agriculture emerging as leading innovations. The authors argue that policymakers can address 17 of the 28 external barriers through targeted regulations, incentives, and guidelines.
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Responsible to whom? Seed innovations and the corporatization of agriculture
Hybrid and genetically engineered seed innovations were developed alongside corporate and chemical industry interests, systematically disadvantaging small farmers and alternative agricultural practices. The paper traces how these technological shifts occurred with minimal public controversy because they were embedded in cultural narratives about seeds and farming that normalized corporate control. The author argues that examining seed innovation through technopolitics and cultural analysis reveals how responsibility gets built into technology design, before those choices become locked into material systems and social practice.
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Progress towards enhanced access and use of technology during the COVID-19 pandemic: A need to be mindful of the continued digital divide for many rural and northern communities
COVID-19 accelerated technology adoption in rural and northern areas, but widened the digital divide for many residents. Older adults increased their technology use, and organizations deployed new tools for healthcare, social engagement, and caregiver support. The paper examines strategies to bridge this divide and recommends that policymakers leverage pandemic lessons to ensure rural and northern communities gain lasting benefits from technology access and close persistent digital gaps.
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Scaling up research-for-development innovations in food and agricultural systems
Research-for-development innovations in food and agriculture often fail to scale despite successful pilots, particularly in poor regions. The Canadian International Food Security Research Fund supported applied research to develop and scale innovations. Key lessons show that successful scaling requires embedding innovations within local socio-ecological systems, engaging end users throughout research, enabling participatory decision-making, and ensuring innovations deliver returns for end-users.
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The Process of Policy Innovation: Prison Sitings in Rural North Carolina
This study examines why 79 rural North Carolina counties chose to site prisons between 1970 and 2000. The researchers found that demographic factors—particularly education levels and community opposition to controversial projects—were stronger predictors of prison siting decisions than economic distress or racial composition. The analysis challenges the assumption that economically struggling rural areas drive prison location choices.
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The role of agricultural innovation on Pacific Islands: a case study from Hawai'i Island
Between 1400 and 1650, Hawaiian farmers developed terraced fields, irrigation systems, and windbreaks that opened 60 percent of available farmland. These innovations enabled agriculture in marginal areas, increased food surplus, and supported population growth and elite competition. The expanded agricultural base allowed societies to support non-producers across larger territories, driving the transition to surplus-driven economies.
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Is a Broadly Based Surgical Residency Program More Likely to Place Graduates in Rural Practice?
Rural areas face a shortage of general surgeons because typical residency programs don't train residents in the broad range of procedures rural surgeons actually perform. This study surveyed graduates from a broadly based surgical residency program and found that residents who received training across multiple surgical specialties—including orthopedics, gynecology, and genitourinary procedures—were more likely to practice in rural settings. Surgeons raised in rural areas particularly returned to rural practice.
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The “digital divide” for rural small businesses
Rural small businesses in North Carolina lag behind non-rural counterparts in adopting digital marketing practices, despite having improved broadband access. The digital divide for rural businesses stems not from lack of internet connectivity but from failure to use web and social media marketing tools effectively. Policymakers must address both infrastructure and business capacity to use it.
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“Communities in the middle”: Interactions between drivers of change and place-based characteristics in rural forest-based communities
Rural forest-based communities in the middle of the United States—neither wilderness nor urban edges—face common shocks including industrial decline, demographic change, climate change, and new energy demands. The paper shows that communities respond differently based on interactions between local conditions and larger drivers of change. Three development trajectories emerge, shaped by the resource base, connectivity to other places, and social adaptability. The framework identifies vulnerabilities, opportunities, and novel recombinations as key to understanding how these communities adapt.
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Teachers Bridging the Digital Divide in Rural Schools with 1:1 Computing
A study of rural Florida teachers implementing 1:1 computing found that perceived ease of use and usefulness predicted adoption. Teachers integrated the technology primarily to build digital literacy, enable collaboration, and assess students. Their motivation centered on boosting engagement, personalizing learning, and improving productivity.
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Toward Sustainability: Novelties, Areas of Learning and Innovation in Urban Agriculture
Urban agriculture in U.S. cities generates innovations across four key areas: financing, production technology, market development, and social acceptance. Researchers interviewed practitioners in New York, Philadelphia, and Chicago to identify how they overcome obstacles and drive change. The study finds that urban agriculture novelties can enhance positive impacts on cities and create opportunities for social learning and broader societal transformation.
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The evolution of the MasAgro hubs: responsiveness and serendipity as drivers of agricultural innovation in a dynamic and heterogeneous context
The MasAgro program in Mexico evolved from a narrow technology focus to a broader innovation system approach by adapting to local contexts and opportunities. Hub managers drove this shift through responsive management, creating diverse partnerships and technology portfolios suited to different regions. The research shows that effective large-scale agricultural programs require stable macro-level vision combined with flexibility at implementation levels to accommodate farmer diversity and institutional change.
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Public private partnerships for agricultural innovation: concepts and experiences from 124 cases in Latin America
Public-private partnerships for agricultural innovation in Latin America often lack clear cost-benefit planning despite forming frequently. The paper identifies four conditions for successful partnerships: no single partner can achieve goals alone, partners gain more than they invest, synergy exists, and gains distribute proportionally. Evidence shows private companies participate readily because investments are low or tax-deductible, but both parties need coherent planning to improve partnership viability.
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The role of living labs in cultivating inclusive and responsible innovation in precision agriculture
Living labs serve as effective platforms for developing precision agriculture technologies that meet farmer and community needs. Researchers used an interdisciplinary approach combining farmer interviews, field data collection, experiments with payment incentives, design workshops, and extension activities. The methodology produced sustainable solutions that balance social, economic, and environmental concerns. Including diverse experts and engaging farmers throughout the innovation process proved essential for creating trustworthy, responsible agricultural technologies.
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Rural Measures: A Quantitative Study of The Rural Digital Divide
This study develops and tests an inexpensive methodology to accurately measure the rural-urban digital divide by combining broadband quality and availability metrics with quality-of-life measures from the consumer perspective. Two pilot studies refined the approach, demonstrating that reliable measurement is possible. The authors provide recommendations for policymakers and researchers seeking to direct public assistance more effectively.
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The Politics of Good Enough: Rural Broadband and Policy Failure in the United States
U.S. rural broadband policy has failed to close the digital divide despite universal service mandates and billions in deployment funding. The author identifies three policy failures—meaning, mapping, and money—rooted in a "politics of good enough" that accepts inadequate standards. Over 42 million Americans, predominantly rural residents, lack high-speed internet access, a crisis intensified by COVID-19's shift to remote work and learning.
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Reconstructive Social Innovation Cycles in Women-Led Initiatives in Rural Areas
Women-led social innovations in rural Canada, Italy, Lebanon, Morocco, and Serbia address gender equity challenges by reconstructing discriminatory practices, institutions, and beliefs. The study identifies a reconstructive social innovation cycle—cyclical processes where women engage through civil society initiatives to question and transform marginalizing norms. These innovations operate across everyday practices, institutional structures, and cognitive frames, offering concrete pathways for rural women to overcome patriarchal barriers and create opportunities for education and employment.
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Rural and non-rural digital divide persists in older adults: Internet access, usage, and attitudes toward technology
Rural older adults have significantly lower internet access rates (54%) compared to urban (66%) and suburban residents (61%). Rural seniors use communication, financial, and media technologies less frequently and hold more negative attitudes toward technology, viewing it as complicated and hard to learn. Targeted interventions are needed to reduce the digital divide in rural communities.
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Design, innovation, and rural creative places: Are the arts the cherry on top, or the secret sauce?
Rural establishments with strong design orientations—particularly those integrating design into core operations—grow faster economically than those without systematic design approaches. Design-intensive rural firms cluster in counties with educated workforces and performing arts organizations. The study identifies three distinct design and innovation orientations among rural businesses and confirms that design integration correlates with wage growth during economic recovery, suggesting design capability drives rural economic performance.
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Broadband and civic engagement in rural areas: What matters?
Broadband adoption, rather than mere access or infrastructure, most strongly correlates with civic engagement in rural US communities. Community anchor institutions matter specifically for neighbor interactions and school confidence. The study analyzed 19 civic engagement metrics from national surveys using state and household-level data, finding adoption consistently outperforms access and infrastructure measures in predicting community involvement.
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Can digital technologies reshape rural microfinance? Implications for savings, credit, & insurance
Digital technologies like mobile money, digital credit scoring, and satellite imagery can address rural microfinance challenges by reducing information gaps and transaction costs in savings, credit, and insurance markets. The paper reviews evidence across these three domains and finds promising potential, but warns that digital tools have limitations requiring careful evaluation and oversight to ensure the resulting financial systems are more efficient and equitable than current alternatives.
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Chefs as change-makers from the kitchen: indigenous knowledge and traditional food as sustainability innovations
Kitchens and chefs drive food system transformation by leveraging traditional knowledge of local food species to create nutritious, delicious dishes. The paper identifies cooks as key innovators addressing food security and sustainability challenges. By connecting indigenous food knowledge to contemporary culinary practice, chefs help build more equitable and environmentally sustainable food systems.
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Are Women Better Bankers to the Poor? Evidence from Rural Microfinance Institutions
Microfinance institutions with female CEOs achieve significantly higher outreach efficiency in serving poor populations while maintaining financial sustainability compared to those led by men. Using stochastic frontier analysis on panel data from over 250 MFIs, the researchers found that female leadership correlates with better performance across both social and financial goals. Promoting women to top management positions in microfinance yields measurable benefits for both poverty alleviation and institutional viability.
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Driving rural energy access: a second-life application for electric-vehicle batteries
Retired electric vehicle batteries can power rural energy grids in developing countries more cheaply and sustainably than current lead-acid systems. The authors model how batteries from EVs sold through 2020 will generate 120–549 GWh of storage capacity by 2028, sufficient to support community-scale microgrids. Four economic scenarios across different battery chemistries show feasible deployment pathways that could significantly expand electrification in remote areas.
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Indigenous in the city: contemporary identities and cultural innovation
This edited collection examines how Indigenous peoples in Canada, the United States, Australia, and New Zealand construct and maintain cultural identities while living in urban environments. The chapters document Indigenous urbanization patterns, community formation, legal recognition, place-making practices, and cultural innovation in cities. The work shows how Indigenous communities adapt traditional identities to contemporary urban contexts through institutions, social networks, and cultural practices like powwows.
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Women empowerment through social innovation in indigenous social enterprises
A Zapotec indigenous social enterprise in Mexico empowers women through job stability, low-interest microcredits, and gender-equality policies. These mechanisms enable economic empowerment despite male-dominated cultural norms, allowing women to start micro-enterprises and participate in decision-making. The organization improves community wellbeing and shifts cultural attitudes toward greater equality.
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Bridging the rural efficiency gap: expanding access to energy efficiency upgrades in remote and high energy cost communities
Rural communities in the USA, particularly in Alaska, Maine, New Hampshire, and Vermont, face a "rural energy efficiency gap" where residents pay 33% higher energy burdens than urban areas but struggle to access efficiency upgrades. Geographic isolation, financial constraints, and lack of awareness create barriers that prevent those most needing efficiency improvements from obtaining them. The paper identifies these barriers and documents strategies that help rural residents access home energy upgrades, reduce bills, and improve comfort.
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On the urban-rural bus transit system with passenger-freight mixed flow
This paper examines bus transit systems that serve both urban and rural areas while carrying mixed passenger and freight loads. The authors analyze how combining these functions affects system efficiency and operations, providing insights into integrated transportation solutions that can serve dispersed rural populations while maintaining economic viability through freight revenue.
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Voluntary Simplicity, Involuntary Complexities, and the Pull of Remove: The Radical Ruralities of off-Grid Lifestyles
Off-grid residents in Canada's Yukon pursue voluntary simplicity by disconnecting from electricity, water, gas, and other infrastructure networks. However, the paper argues this lifestyle is not freely chosen but shaped by biographical and geographical constraints. The daily complexities of off-grid living create paradoxical, marginal spaces that reveal how residents navigate contradictions between their simplicity values and the demanding realities of their chosen isolation.
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China's pursuits of indigenous innovations in information technology developments: hopes, follies and uncertainties
China pursues indigenous innovation in information technology to reduce dependence on American dominance, mobilizing national resources to develop core hardware and software capabilities and lead in next-generation networks. However, domestic political-economic constraints and China's deep integration into global capitalist markets complicate these efforts, creating tensions between the state's technological sovereignty goals and the transnational nature of modern IT development.
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“Indians Don't Make Maps”: Indigenous Cartographic Traditions and Innovations
Indigenous cartographers have developed distinct mapping traditions that challenge colonial knowledge systems and assert sovereignty over territory and land relationships. The paper documents historical and contemporary Indigenous cartographic innovations and argues that expanding cartographic training in Indigenous communities strengthens cultural documentation, tribal sovereignty, and restorative justice efforts.
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Indigenous Knowledge, Mapping, and GIS: A Diffusion of Innovation Perspective
Indigenous peoples are increasingly adopting GIS technology to map and communicate their traditional knowledge. Using a diffusion of innovation framework, this paper examines how Indigenous communities have adopted and implemented GIS based on published research and fieldwork. The authors identify gaps in current understanding and recommend future research directions to better support Indigenous peoples' use of high-technology mapping for preserving and sharing their knowledge systems.
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Hybrid Renewable Energy Systems for Sustainable Rural Development: Perspectives and Challenges in Energy Systems Modeling
Hybrid renewable energy systems effectively electrify rural areas while reducing costs and emissions. Computational optimization models can design these systems while accounting for social factors like health, education, and income. The paper argues that energy modeling tools must evolve to integrate interdisciplinary perspectives and address broader societal transformations beyond traditional cost optimization approaches.
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Investigating science learning for rural elementary school teachers in a professional-development project through three distance-education strategies
This study compared three distance-education approaches for teaching science to 94 rural Midwestern elementary teachers: live interactive television, videotaped presentations with live discussion, and asynchronous web-based sessions. Live interactive television produced the highest learning gains across all assessment types, followed by web-based learning, then videotaped presentations. The findings show that real-time interaction significantly improves science learning outcomes for rural teachers in professional development.
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Sustainable Rural Development: Solar/Biomass Hybrid Renewable Energy System
Researchers developed a hybrid renewable energy system combining solar panels, battery storage, and a biomass gasifier to provide affordable electricity and clean water to rural communities lacking reliable energy and potable water access. The system uses waste heat from the biomass generator to purify saltwater through membrane distillation. Analysis shows the combined approach produces electricity and water at costs rural populations can afford, offering a viable solution for sustainable rural development.
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Performance characterization of low-cost air quality sensors for off-grid deployment in rural Malawi
Low-cost air quality sensors deployed in rural Malawi can effectively monitor air pollution when calibrated using data from regulatory sites in wealthier regions. Machine learning models, particularly k-nearest neighbors hybrid approaches, successfully calibrate electrochemical gas sensors and transfer well to deployment conditions. Optical particle counters performed poorly in high humidity and near biomass burning. Data recovery was limited by power constraints, but sensors showed no decay over one year. The study demonstrates feasibility while identifying needs for improved power systems and regional monitoring infrastructure.
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Renewable energy and energy storage systems in rural electrical power systems: Issues, challenges and application guidelines
Renewable energy integration into rural electrical grids faces significant challenges because non-dispatchable sources like wind and solar don't align with traditional grid design. Distributed electrical energy storage systems solve this problem by enabling reliable incorporation of renewable resources while improving overall power system performance and resilience.
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Improving Women and Family’s Health through Integrated Microfinance, Health Education and Promotion in Rural Areas
Integrated microfinance combined with health education and promotion activities significantly improves rural women and family health outcomes. The review of peer-reviewed research shows these combined programs reduce intimate-partner violence, lower HIV/AIDS risk, promote mental health, and improve overall family wellbeing. Economic empowerment through local business support paired with preventive health training creates greater impact than either intervention alone in rural areas.
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Rural Off-Grid Electricity Service in Sub-Saharan Africa [Technology Leaders]
Sub-Saharan Africa faces severe electricity access challenges, with installed generation capacity far below demand for its 860 million people. Nineteen of the world's twenty least-electrified countries are in this region, and rural electrification rates fall below 15%. Decades of underinvestment have created a critical infrastructure gap that impedes development across the region.
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Renewable energy communities in rural areas: A comprehensive overview of current development, challenges, and emerging trends
This review of 86 articles examines renewable energy communities in rural areas across 2004–2024. Rural energy development, community engagement, and agricultural integration drive growth. Systems are shifting from localized solutions to integrated hybrid systems and smart grids. Key challenges include financial constraints, infrastructure gaps, regulatory barriers, and low participation rates. Environmental benefits matter most in China, Thailand, and Italy, while economic gains dominate in the U.S., Poland, and India. Success requires resilience, scalability, innovation, supportive policies, and strong community involvement.
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A GIS‐based method to identify cost‐effective routes for rural deviated fixed route transit
This paper presents a GIS-based method to design cost-effective deviated fixed route transit (DFRT) services connecting rural and urban areas in the USA. Using demand distribution and road network data, the approach generates candidate routes of varying lengths and identifies the most cost-effective option by operating cost per passenger trip. A case study in Tennessee shows that optimal route length varies by location, helping government agencies select routes that minimize costs within specified budgets.
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MicroFEWs: A Food–Energy–Water Systems Approach to Renewable Energy Decisions in Islanded Microgrid Communities in Rural Alaska
Remote Alaskan communities face interconnected challenges across food, energy, and water systems. This paper introduces the MicroFEWs approach, which helps these isolated communities make renewable energy decisions while protecting food security. Using Cordova, Alaska as a case study, the authors show how increased renewable energy generation affects the local fish processing industry and overall community resilience. The framework offers a replicable model for other remote regions.
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Supporting Self-Determined Indigenous Innovations: Rethinking the Digital Divide in Canada
This paper challenges the Western narrative about Indigenous peoples and technology adoption, examining how Indigenous communities in Canada engage with digital innovation on their own terms. Rather than viewing Indigenous peoples as resistant to technology, the authors argue for recognizing self-determined Indigenous innovations and rethinking how the digital divide is conceptualized in ways that respect Indigenous autonomy and knowledge systems.
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Rural Solar Cookers, an Alternative to Reduce the Timber Resource Extraction through the Use of Renewable Energy Sources: Technology Transfer and Monitoring Project
Researchers designed and distributed 70 solar cookers to an indigenous community in Michoacán, Mexico, to replace wood-burning cooking methods. The parabolic concentrator cookers use polished aluminum reflectors and manual tracking. The project aims to cut timber consumption by 30%, reduce respiratory disease from smoke inhalation, improve household economics, and promote renewable energy adoption. Monitoring is underway to measure actual consumption reductions.
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Effects of Rising Gas Prices on Bus Ridership for Small Urban and Rural Transit Systems
Rising gasoline prices increase bus ridership in small urban and rural transit systems, but the effect is modest. Using dynamic models on ten years of data from eleven Midwest and mountain state transit agencies, the study finds ridership elasticity ranges from 0.08 to 0.22 relative to gas prices. Higher fares from increased ridership do not offset transit agencies' rising fuel costs.
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Energy justice, renewable energy, and the rural-urban divide: Insights from the Southwest U.S.
This study examines energy justice in rural and urban Arizona communities near a large-scale solar-wind park. Researchers found that small-scale renewable energy projects better served low-income populations than large-scale installations. Urban areas received more government and nonprofit support for renewable initiatives than rural areas. Large-scale projects created adverse community and wildlife impacts without adequate benefit-sharing. The authors recommend expanding small-scale solar capacity, increasing funding for local energy efficiency programs, and supporting low-income housing and community facilities.
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Making heart-lung machines work in India: Imports, indigenous innovation and the challenge of replicating cardiac surgery in Bombay, 1952-1962
Two Bombay surgeons successfully performed open-heart surgery using heart-lung machines in 1962, despite India's restrictions on foreign imports and currency exchange. Kersi Dastur leveraged local Parsi manufacturing networks while PK Sen used Rockefeller Foundation connections to access international training and equipment. Both faced steep learning curves adapting imported technology to local conditions. Their success required substantial resources and reflected nationalist politics valuing indigenous innovation alongside imported technology.
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Rural Electrification Goes Local: Recent innovations in renewable generation, energy efficiency, and grid modernization
Rural areas face infrastructure challenges due to sparse, dispersed populations. The paper examines how renewable energy generation, energy efficiency improvements, and modernized grids address rural electrification. It notes that rural definitions vary globally but consistently describe low-density settlements where farming dominates, creating barriers to infrastructure development that limit economic activity and household incomes.
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The Indigenous primary health care and policy research network: Guiding innovation within primary health care with Indigenous peoples in Alberta
Alberta stakeholders convened in 2019 to address fragmented health initiatives following Canada's Truth and Reconciliation Commission calls for reform. They established the Indigenous Primary Health Care and Policy Research Network to coordinate efforts across the province. The network aims to transform primary health care delivery and achieve health equity for Indigenous peoples by aligning initiatives with reconciliation principles and implementing the Commission's health-related recommendations.
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Startup process, safety and risk assessment of biomass gasification for off-grid rural electrification
Biomass gasification offers promise for off-grid rural electricity generation, but startup procedures pose serious safety risks including fire, explosion, and toxic emissions. This study analyzes hazards during the heating startup phase of downdraft gasifiers and identifies heating temperature as the critical safety factor. The authors propose safety protocols that reduce risks from fire, explosion, and harmful emissions, enabling more reliable operation of gasification systems in rural areas.
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Absorptive Capacity in Rural Schools: Bending Not Breaking During Disruptive Innovation Implementation
Rural schools successfully implemented disruptive education policy innovations by developing absorptive capacity through specific leadership strategies and organizational processes. School leaders used buffering, bridging, and brokering tactics alongside shared goal-setting, curriculum revision, and teacher collaboration to maintain student performance while selectively adopting external reforms. These mechanisms enabled educators to assimilate and transform new knowledge without abandoning existing strengths.
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The Decolonized Quadruple Bottom Line: A Framework for Developing Indigenous Innovation
This paper proposes a decolonized quadruple bottom line framework for indigenous innovation and entrepreneurship. Rather than the standard triple bottom line (people, planet, profit), the authors add spirituality and culture as essential factors. The framework combines community, spirituality, sustainability, and entrepreneurship to create indigenous innovation that supports sustainable economic development for American Indian nations and communities.
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Enabling Indigenous innovations to re-centre social licence to operate in the Blue Economy
The paper argues that sustainable Blue Economy development requires centering Indigenous perspectives on social licence to operate. It calls for shifting governance practices so Indigenous groups grant consent based on their own values at every project stage, not just initial approval. The authors propose collaborative arrangements and Indigenous-led platforms that respect historical, social, cultural, and economic contexts, enabling Indigenous peoples to participate equitably in ocean-based industries and business agreements.
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Construction Management Challenges and Best Practices for Rural Transit Projects
Rural transit projects face distinct construction management challenges due to limited resources, geographic dispersion, and lack of expertise. This study surveyed 33 U.S. state transportation departments and two Canadian provinces, then validated findings through seven case studies. Key challenges include documentation gaps, staffing shortages, remote location difficulties, small contractor limitations, communication problems, and local environmental issues. The research identifies targeted best practices to address these rural-specific challenges and distinguishes construction management approaches needed for small rural projects versus large urban ones.
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Facing Societal Challenges: The Need for New Paradigms in Rural Transit Service
Rural transit operators must adopt new service paradigms to address changing societal needs. The paper identifies five new organizational and delivery models that rural transit systems can implement to better serve evolving rural populations and meet contemporary transportation challenges across diverse rural settings.
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Use characteristics and demographics of rural transit riders: a case study in Tennessee
Rural transit riders in Tennessee using deviated fixed route and demand responsive services are predominantly captive riders with limited transportation alternatives. These riders typically have lower incomes, fewer cars, and are more likely to be renters and non-white. Medical care is their primary trip purpose, distinguishing them from intercity bus users. Education levels correlate with openness to using rural transit services.
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Administrative challenges and rewards of online learning in a rural community college: Reflections of a distance learning administrator
A rural community college in central Michigan developed online learning programs that transformed teaching, learning, and institutional operations. The administrator describes the specific challenges and rewards encountered while building distance education capacity in a small rural institution, revealing how online learning reshaped the college's processes and systems.
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Protecting and promoting indigenous knowledge: environmental adult education and organic agriculture
Environmental adult educators can promote sustainable living by recognizing organic farmers' knowledge as indigenous knowledge. The paper argues that organic agriculture's knowledge system—including its spiritual dimensions—fits better within UNESCO's indigenous knowledge framework than Habermasian theory, while maintaining capacity for critique and transformation. This approach helps adult education address food security and environmental sustainability by connecting farming practices to indigenous knowledge systems.
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MODELING TRANSIT ISSUES UNIQUE TO HURRICANE EVACUATIONS: NORTH CAROLINA'S SMALL URBAN AND RURAL AREAS
This paper develops a traffic operations model to plan hurricane evacuations in North Carolina's small urban and rural areas. The researchers identify evacuation timelines, traffic bottlenecks, and congestion-reduction strategies. They also create a methodology for scheduling buses to evacuate elderly and disabled residents who cannot leave by private vehicle, demonstrated through case studies of specific North Carolina communities.
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How to Decolonize Democracy: Indigenous Governance Innovation in Bolivia and Nunavut, Canada
Bolivia and Nunavut, Canada have pioneered large-scale Indigenous governance experiments where marginalized Indigenous majorities gained democratic power. Bolivia integrated direct, participatory, and communitarian elements into its democratic system, significantly improving Indigenous representation. Nunavut's Inuit government incorporated Inuit values into Canada's governmental framework. Despite ongoing social and economic challenges, both cases achieved democratic gains by creating new participation mechanisms that expand liberal democracy beyond traditional conceptions.
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Smart Integrated Renewable Energy Systems (SIRES) for rural communities
The paper proposes Smart Integrated Renewable Energy Systems (SIRES) to address energy poverty in rural areas. SIRES combines renewable energy technologies with intelligent management to provide multiple essential services—biogas for cooking, water for domestic and irrigation use, and electricity for lighting, communication, cold storage, education, and small-scale industry. This integrated approach promotes sustainable development and improves living standards in energy-deprived rural communities.
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Policy Window or Hazy Dream? Policy and Practice Innovations for Creating Effective Learning Environments in Rural Schools.
Rural schools in Manitoba face tensions between local priorities and urbanizing policy agendas that undermine educational quality. A provincial survey and four case studies identified three central priorities for effective rural learning environments: improving student outcomes, ensuring quality teachers and administrators, and securing adequate educational finance. School divisions, superintendent and trustee associations, and provincial education officials are collaborating to address these challenges through policy innovations.
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Design of an off-grid energy kiosk in rural Zambia
Researchers designed an off-grid solar energy kiosk for rural Zambia that charges mobile phones and rents portable battery kits with LED lights to households. The 1.8 kW photovoltaic system operates on a fee-based retail model, with revenue funding sustainable operation and expansion. Community surveys and simulations informed the technical and business design, ensuring reliability and local appropriateness.
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Just-in-time online professional development activities for an innovation in small rural schools / Activités de perfectionnement professionnel « juste-à-temps » pour l’innovation dans les petites écoles rurales
Remote Networked Schools, a Quebec initiative, provided just-in-time online professional development to teachers in small rural schools to integrate information and communication technologies into learning. Over six years, a university intervention team designed and delivered targeted professional development activities. The study identifies which types of professional development activities teachers actually used and how they supported ICT innovation in rural classrooms.
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The Impact of High School Distance e-Learning Experience on Rural Students' University Achievement and Persistence
Rural high school students with prior distance e-learning experience perform differently and persist at different rates in their first year of university compared to peers without online learning background. The study analyzed archival data to examine how secondary-level distance education affects post-secondary achievement and continuation, finding significant differences between the two groups.
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Serviceability Index to Evaluate Rural Demand-Responsive Transit System Operations
This paper develops a serviceability index to measure the capacity and quality of demand-responsive transit systems in rural areas. The authors surveyed transit providers in Alabama and created a methodology that uses regional socioeconomic conditions and operational data to evaluate performance. The index allows rural transit agencies to assess and compare their demand-responsive operations, addressing a gap in national transit analysis standards.
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Roadmapping 5.0 Technologies in Agriculture: A Technological Proposal for Developing the Coffee Plant Centered on Indigenous Producers’ Requirements from Mexico, via Knowledge Management
This study develops a technology roadmap for Mexican indigenous coffee producers to adopt Industry 5.0 technologies. Researchers analyzed needs across five Mexican localities and identified key practices—monitoring, soil analysis, organic fertilizer production, and experimentation—that should be supported by mobile apps, sensors, virtual platforms, greenhouses, and spectrophotometric tools. The proposal prioritizes producer requirements and local contexts to address pest-related production losses affecting global coffee economies.
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Assembling indigeneity: Rethinking innovation, tradition and indigenous materiality in a 19th-century native toolkit
This paper analyzes iron tools from a 19th-century Nipmuc home site in Massachusetts to understand how Native woodsplint basketmaking emerged as a trade practice. The baskets were marketed as traditional and authentic to Anglo-American buyers, yet their forms, decorations, and tools were actually innovations developed in post-Revolutionary economic conditions. The author uses assemblage theory to show how Indigenous innovation and tradition coexist rather than conflict.
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The DC House Project: Promoting the use of renewable energy for rural electrification
The DC House Project promotes renewable energy adoption for rural electrification. The paper describes the project's phases and components, reports its current status, identifies challenges encountered, and outlines short and long-term goals for expanding renewable energy access to rural communities.
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Tracing the Paths to Sustainable Production and Consumption Through Indigenous Directors, Environmental Innovation, and Sustainability Committees
Indigenous directors significantly drive sustainable production and consumption in Latin American and Caribbean energy firms, with environmental innovation and sustainability committees amplifying this effect. Analysis of 378 firms from 2012–2023 shows indigenous leadership promotes sustainable practices across all performance levels, with stronger impacts at higher quantiles when environmental innovation and committees are present. Regional, policy, and industry factors create substantial variation in outcomes.
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Cost–Benefit Analysis of Rural and Small Urban Transit in the United States
This study measures the economic value of public transit in rural and small urban areas across the United States, which had been largely unmeasured. Using national transit database data, researchers calculated that rural transit generated $1.6 billion in benefits and small urban transit generated $3.7 billion in 2011. Benefit-cost ratios were 1.20 for rural transit and 2.16 for small urban transit, demonstrating that these systems deliver measurable returns on investment, particularly for transportation-disadvantaged populations.
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Explaining the Diffusion of Renewable Electricity Technologies in Canadian Remote Indigenous Communities through the Technological Innovation System Approach
Remote Indigenous communities in Canada's Northwest Territories and Ontario face electricity challenges that renewable energy technologies could address. This study applies the Technological Innovation System framework to explain how renewable energy diffused in these communities from 2000 to 2016. The research identifies systemic failures blocking deployment and finds that policy interventions strengthening local learning and networking could accelerate renewable technology adoption, benefiting remote communities.
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Rural Transit Systems Benefits in Tennessee: Methodology and an Empirical Study
This paper evaluates rural public transit services in Tennessee using a benefits assessment framework. The analysis shows that demand-responsive vanpool services deliver benefits exceeding costs, primarily by improving access to healthcare, job training, and other essential services for current riders. The study demonstrates that without these transit services, providing equivalent access to these activities would cost significantly more, and recommends better data collection on transit ridership.
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Role of renewable energy in the development and electrification of remote and rural areas
Renewable energy resources are widely distributed globally and can effectively electrify remote rural areas despite being dilute and variable. Small amounts of renewable energy create substantial development benefits in these regions, justifying higher costs. Local renewable resource utilization generates employment and reduces rural-to-urban migration.
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Smart Village Load Planning Simulations in Support of Digital Energy Management for Off-grid Rural Community Microgrids
Engineers designing renewable energy systems for isolated rural villages lack real demand data to optimize microgrid planning. This paper presents a computer simulation method that generates realistic hourly electricity load profiles for off-grid villages by modeling typical appliances and household behavior patterns. The simulated load data can be exported into energy modeling software to help engineers test smart microgrid designs, economic optimization strategies, and demand response systems before physical installation.
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Benefits, Barriers, and Intentions/Desires of Nurses Related to Distance Learning in Rural Island Communities
Nurses on Hawaii's Neighbor Islands identified distance learning as valuable for continuing education but faced significant barriers. Cost emerged as the dominant concern across benefits, barriers, and future intentions. The study reveals that hospitals need stronger organizational support and updated curriculum approaches to make distance learning effective for rural nursing staff.
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Informing Canadian Innovation Policy Through a Decolonizing Lens on Indigenous Entrepreneurship and Innovation
Indigenous entrepreneurship remains invisible in Canadian policy despite its economic potential. This paper examines how government frames Indigenous entrepreneurial activities and argues such framing risks exploiting Indigenous lands and knowledge. Drawing on interviews with 13 Manitoba Indigenous entrepreneurs and an ecosystem approach, the author identifies three core concerns: land and community relationships, education relevance, and cultural survival. The paper calls for systemic decolonizing change in how Canadian government policy and higher education institutions approach Indigenous innovation.
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Estimating Ridership of Rural Demand–Response Transit Services for the General Public
This study develops models to predict ridership for rural demand-response transit services. Using national transit database records and survey data from transit agencies, the researchers find that ridership increases with older adult populations and people without vehicle access, while rising fares reduce ridership. Extended service days and shorter reservation notice periods significantly boost ridership. The models outperform previous research by incorporating more detailed service characteristics.
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The Constitution of the White Earth Nation: A New Innovation in a Longstanding Indigenous Literary Tradition
This essay examines the White Earth Nation Constitution as an innovation within indigenous literary traditions. The author traces how Gerald Vizenor and co-authors drew on centuries of indigenous constitutional literature—from the Popol Vuh through colonial petitions to contemporary fiction—to create a living text that uses irony and political critique. The constitution functions as a tool for imagining and inventing indigenous worlds through established literary and political methodologies.
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Renewable Energy Adoption and Its Effect on Rural Development in United States
Renewable energy projects like wind and solar farms in rural United States communities create jobs, increase local tax revenues, and diversify economies. Landowners earn additional income by leasing land for energy production. The study recommends using diffusion of innovations theory and technology acceptance models to guide future research, and calls for stronger policy frameworks and practical interventions to expand renewable energy adoption in rural areas.
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A Canadian Rural Living Lab Hospital: Implementing solutions for improving rural emergency care
A rural hospital in Quebec established a living lab to develop and test solutions for improving emergency care in remote areas. The initiative brings together stakeholders to implement and evaluate innovations including simulation training, telemedicine, point-of-care ultrasound, and drone delivery. The authors expect these interventions to save lives, improve working conditions for rural healthcare staff, and serve as a model for other regions.
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The role of universities in promoting rural innovation in Latin America
Universities in rural Latin America drive innovation by aligning diverse stakeholders with varying needs. The author examines Chiapas, Mexico, showing that successful rural innovation requires universities to coordinate effectively with different actors across the region, creating shared understanding and collaborative frameworks that address local development challenges.
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Advancing Rural Agribusiness Innovation Strategies for Building Climate-Resilient and Economically Inclusive Communities.
Rural agribusinesses drive economic resilience and food security, especially in climate-vulnerable regions. The paper examines how digital agriculture, precision farming, sustainable value chains, and green financing build climate resilience and economic inclusion. It identifies barriers like poor infrastructure and limited finance access, then presents best practices for scaling sustainable models. The analysis of global case studies shows that inclusive ecosystems empowering smallholder farmers and integrating climate-smart approaches create adaptive frameworks that boost productivity and community resilience.
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Women-Led Social Innovation Initiatives Contribute to Gender Equality in Rural Areas: Grounded Theory on Five Initiatives From Three Continents
Women-led social innovation initiatives in rural Canada, Italy, Lebanon, Morocco, and Serbia advance gender equality by strengthening women's collective agency. The study identifies three structural features—gendered identity, women's independence, and control over rules—that enable or constrain these initiatives. Key enabling factors include women's self-confidence, peer networks, and capacity building. These initiatives increase economic independence, reduce cultural skepticism about women's roles, and shift political dynamics, demonstrating that women's collective action effectively overcomes structures that marginalize rural women.
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ARA-O-RAN: End-to-End Programmable O-RAN Living Lab for Agriculture and Rural Communities
ARA-O-RAN is a new wireless testbed built on open radio access network (O-RAN) architecture designed specifically for rural and agricultural applications. The testbed combines outdoor testing across farmland and rural communities with an indoor sandbox, enabling researchers to develop and test wireless technologies that address rural connectivity challenges. It supports end-to-end programmability and aligns with national spectrum policy goals for rural innovation.
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ARA PAWR: Wireless Living Lab for Smart and Connected Rural Communities
ARA PAWR is a wireless living lab deployed in real agricultural and rural settings that achieves high-speed wireless access and backhaul performance, reaching 3.2 Gbps access throughput and over 10 Gbps backhaul throughput across 10+ km distances. The platform enables research experiments using TV white space, mmWave, and 5G technologies, and will be released publicly for community use to advance rural broadband innovation.
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AraSync: Precision Time Synchronization in Rural Wireless Living Lab
AraSync is a time synchronization system designed for rural wireless networks that achieves nanosecond-level accuracy using Precision Time Protocol across fiber and long-range wireless links. The system enables advanced wireless experiments requiring strict timing constraints in 5G, 6G, and Open RAN deployments. Testing shows how wireless channel conditions and weather affect synchronization performance.
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Living lab approaches in rural healthcare: a scoping review
Living labs use user-centered co-design to solve real-world healthcare problems in rural areas. This scoping review examined 11 studies from 2016–2025 across Canada, the USA, Australia, Guatemala, Uganda, and France/Portugal. Studies applied various methodologies including theory-driven frameworks, participatory research, and human-centered design to address cardiovascular disease, diabetes, perinatal care, and other conditions. Most studies did not explicitly use the living lab term, revealing limited adoption of this approach in rural healthcare innovation.
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Frugal innovation in women-led family businesses in rural communities
Women-led family businesses in rural Oaxaca, Mexico use four types of frugal innovation to survive crises: new production and marketing models, operational methods, financing methods, and organizational methods. The study of 160 businesses found that shifting to new financing and organizational approaches proved most critical for survival during disruptions like COVID-19. These findings reveal how resource-constrained women entrepreneurs in the Global South innovate under pressure.
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Bridging gaps in preventive healthcare: Telehealth and digital innovations for rural communities
Telehealth and digital innovations significantly improve healthcare access in rural communities by bridging gaps between urban and rural care. A systematic review of 11 studies from 2021–2024 found that telehealth adoption, supported by AI and digital tools, enhances preventive healthcare education and awareness programs. Despite infrastructure and technology barriers, these innovations deliver positive outcomes and promote health equity for underserved rural populations.
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A systematic review of social innovation and sustainable entrepreneurship practices in the agri-food sector and their contribution to socioenvironmental resilience of rural producers
This systematic review examines social innovation and sustainable entrepreneurship practices in agri-food systems across multiple continents. Initiatives like social agriculture, community gardens, women's cooperatives, and regenerative projects improved social inclusion, market access, and environmental practices. Success required collaborative governance, local leadership, and institutional support. Barriers included weak regulatory frameworks and funding dependency. Hybrid practices combining both approaches strengthened rural resilience when embedded in favorable policy environments.
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Relevant drivers and barriers for transforming Heritage Communities into stakeholders of social innovations in rural an marginal areas: a vademecum
Heritage Communities in rural and marginal areas can drive social innovation by collectively organizing preservation of local natural, cultural, and social resources. This vademecum identifies drivers and barriers for integrating Heritage Communities into public policy to support territorial resilience. It examines legal, economic, and organizational mechanisms these communities can use, emphasizing tourism's role in sustainability and economic benefit, while documenting structural obstacles to implementing heritage principles and commons approaches.
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Beyond the scalpel: redefining surgical training for tomorrow01. Perceptions and the impact of early mentorship of medical students in neurosurgery: a qualitative study02. Mentorship in otolaryngology – head and neck surgery: a scoping review03. From pipeline to practice: a scoping review of interventions to increase underrepresented minority representation in surgery04. Integrating grassroots advocacy initiatives into academic medical conferences: a model for building equity into academia05. The influence of a student research and networking conference on women medical students’ interest in surgery06. Assessing well-being among the breast cancer and melanoma care team07. Cutting-Edge: a podcast dedicated to global and rural surgical needs08. The impact of a night float call system within an orthopedic residency program: a prospective analysis on resident wellness, satisfaction, and education09. From fatigue to function: designing Canada’s first surgical ergonomics curriculum for medical students10. Mapping wellness initiatives in North American ophthalmology residency programs: an environmental scan11. Accelerating diagnostic competency in pediatric musculoskeletal radiograph interpretation among orthopedic postgraduate trainees12. A systematic review of artificial intelligence applications in gastrointestinal endoscopy training13. InSight: a resident-led slit-lamp workshop for preclerkship medical students14. Artificial intelligence in surgical education: insights and applications for otolaryngology – head and neck surgery and beyond15. Workload-adapted laparoscopic training: a trade-off between in-training gains and post-training skill transfer16. Skill assessment of operators: in-training bimanual coordination predicts post-training laparoscopic skill17. Microsurgery simulation program for medical students: Start sooner rather than later?18. Guiding the surgical innovation process: a systematic review and analysis of the current frameworks19. Operating on moving platforms: how whole-body motion and distractions affect surgical precision and cognitive workload20. Expanding Clerkship Active Recall Decks in Surgery (CARDS): 1 year of growth and integration in surgical education21. An innovative virtual platform for teaching surgical suturing in French22. Asynchronous online learning to supplement musculoskeletal education for rural general practice23. Peer-led anatomy education: effectiveness of virtual review sessions and mock exams for dissection and prosection-based learners24. Development of an online curriculum for teaching the National Undergraduate Surgical Learning Objectives in thoracic surgery using Surgery 10125. Can you tube it? Evaluating the educational quality of YouTube videos on thoracoscopic esophageal atresia repair in pediatric surgery26. The role of telemedicine in surgical care across rural and urban settings: a scoping review27. Summarizing EPA feedback with LLMs: a quality improvement study in general surgery28. Automated assessment of medical student performance on suturing activities using multimodal vision-language models29. Multiple choice examinations in surgery: correlations with academic success30. Delivery of a plastic and reconstructive surgery case-based learning curriculum for medical students31. Comparing the impact of formal versus informal mentorship in surgery: a study of medical students and surgical residents32. Effectiveness of a near-peer teaching model in a 1-day otolaryngology emergencies workshop for medical students33. Building simulation literacy for future surgical education leaders: identifying competencies and observable practice activities to inform targeted educational offerings34. A novel pelvic hand-sewn bowel anastomosis simulator for surgical training35. Evaluating specialized extended reality as a teaching tool for undergraduate medical education36. Practising together: a theory-informed exploratory study of how simulation for high-acuity, low-opportunity events in cardiac surgery can transfer to safe entrustment37. Teaching strategies for flexible nasolaryngoscopy training in medical students and residents: a scoping review38. Peer-taught surgical skills at the beginner level for medical students: a pilot randomized controlled study39. Exploring the definition of service in postgraduate obstetrics and gynecology residency
Early mentorship and clinical exposure significantly shape medical students' interest in neurosurgery and counter negative stereotypes. Female students face particular barriers related to family planning concerns and underrepresentation. Curricular gaps limit early exploration of the field. The study recommends preclerkship electives, expanded clerkship access, simulation training, conference funding, and structured mentorship with diverse role models to increase interest and diversity in neurosurgery.
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A systematic review of the scope and impact of rural primary healthcare innovations using digital health technology
Digital health technologies in rural primary healthcare—particularly telemedicine and remote monitoring—improve accessibility and health outcomes while reducing costs. A systematic review of 66 studies found these interventions work best for chronic conditions like diabetes and cardiovascular disease. Success depends on practitioner endorsement, process standardization, and patient satisfaction. Key barriers include staff workload and patient non-compliance. The review recommends government funding and flexible policies to support digital healthcare expansion in rural areas.
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The rural in democratic innovations: a comparative proposal between Latin America and Europe
Democratic innovations in rural Europe focus on development, environment, and local economics within existing political structures, emphasizing institutional strengthening and sustainability. Rural Latin America uses democratic innovations differently—as tools for emancipatory struggles including indigenous rights defense and food sovereignty. The paper argues these innovations challenge fundamental notions of development and rights in Latin America, whereas European innovations primarily improve public policies without questioning the political model.
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Rural digital social innovation for health and social care: A systematic review
This systematic review of 25 studies examines how digital technology enables social innovation in rural health and social care. Healthcare innovations typically address geographical distance between providers and patients through collaborative processes, while community initiatives tackle local challenges through grassroots efforts. Most innovations showed positive outcomes on health service use and community health. Digital tools expanded innovation scope and reach, but success required substantial human investment and genuine rural community engagement alongside technology.
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Social Innovation and Sustainability in Rural Organizations in Southern Sonora
Rural organizations in southern Sonora show limited social innovation implementation due to small size and low technological capacity. A survey of 200 members reveals that social innovation dimensions—particularly social impact, innovation type, economic viability, and replicability—positively influence organizational sustainability. Intersectoral collaboration showed no significant effect. The findings demonstrate how social innovation strengthens rural organizations and inform policy design for local development.
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Community-driven food networks as vehicles of rural social innovation
Two community-driven food networks in rural Cape Breton, Canada—one Indigenous-led and one non-Indigenous—demonstrate how integrated programming combining food access, wellness, and employment initiatives builds social cohesion, local capacity, and community dignity. These networks function as rural social innovation infrastructure rather than charity, addressing food insecurity, isolation, and economic marginalization while fostering inclusion and resilience.
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Bridging the Divide: Digital Innovation as a Catalyst for Healthcare Equity between Urban and Rural Populations
Digital health innovations including telehealth, electronic prescribing, and AI clinical decision support reduce healthcare disparities between rural and urban populations by improving appointment completion, medication access, and specialist care availability. However, technology alone fails—successful implementation requires supportive policies, infrastructure investment, and community engagement to create sustainable systems that maintain quality standards across geographic boundaries.
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Demo: Ara Pawr Wireless Living Lab for Smart and Connected Rural Communities
ARA is a wireless research platform designed for rural communities, featuring the first real-world implementation of long-distance wireless systems spanning over 30 km. It integrates software-defined radios and commercial equipment to enable experiments across user devices, base stations, edge computing, and cloud infrastructure. The platform supports advanced wireless research including MIMO in TV white space bands, long-range backhaul communications, and open-source 5G protocols, advancing next-generation wireless innovation for rural regions.
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Social innovation and governance in the context of a rural third sector organization in Zumpahuacán, State of Mexico
A rural third-sector organization in Mexico's State of Mexico drives social innovation and governance through collective action, community identity, and actor relationships. The study identifies intercommunity organization linked with external actors as the key mechanism enabling social innovation to address poverty, marginalization, and inequality at the local level.
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Laboratory of Social Innovation in Water Engineering and its effect on the provision of drinking water service in rural areas and marginalized urban areas
A social innovation laboratory in water engineering trained students to design and build drinking water systems for rural and marginalized communities lacking access. The laboratory focused on sustainable water supply solutions, connecting water sources to underserved areas. Results demonstrate that students developed both technical and cross-disciplinary competencies in water sustainability through hands-on project work addressing real community needs.
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Absorptive Capacity: A Review, Reconceptualization, and Extension
This paper reviews and reconceptualizes absorptive capacity—a firm's ability to recognize, assimilate, and apply external knowledge. The authors distinguish between potential capacity (acquiring and assimilating knowledge) and realized capacity (transforming and exploiting knowledge). They develop a model showing how these two capacities differently affect competitive advantage under varying organizational conditions.
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Collaboration Networks, Structural Holes, and Innovation: A Longitudinal Study
This longitudinal study of chemical industry firms shows that direct and indirect business relationships both boost innovation output. However, structural holes—disconnections between a firm's partners—reduce innovation in interfirm collaboration networks. The research demonstrates that network structure significantly affects innovation performance, and optimal network design depends on what firms aim to achieve.
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KNOWLEDGE TRANSFER IN INTRAORGANIZATIONAL NETWORKS: EFFECTS OF NETWORK POSITION AND ABSORPTIVE CAPACITY ON BUSINESS UNIT INNOVATION AND PERFORMANCE.
Business units within large organizations benefit from knowledge transfer with other units. Units positioned centrally in organizational networks and those with strong absorptive capacity—the ability to recognize and apply external knowledge—innovate more effectively and perform better. Strategic network positioning and internal learning capacity drive innovation outcomes across organizational units.
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Open Innovation: The New Imperative For Creating and Profiting From Technology
This paper introduces open innovation as a strategic approach for technology development and commercialization. Organizations increasingly leverage external knowledge sources alongside internal R&D to create and profit from innovations. The framework challenges traditional closed innovation models and demonstrates how firms can accelerate innovation cycles and improve financial returns by opening their innovation processes to external partners and contributors.
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Value creation in innovation ecosystems: how the structure of technological interdependence affects firm performance in new technology generations
Firm performance in innovation ecosystems depends on where external innovators face challenges. The authors analyze semiconductor lithography equipment from 1962 to 2005 across nine technology generations. They find that upstream component challenges benefit technology leaders, while downstream complement challenges harm them. Vertical integration becomes more effective at managing ecosystem interdependence as technologies mature.
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Open Source Software and the “Private-Collective” Innovation Model: Issues for Organization Science
Open source software development represents a hybrid innovation model combining private investment and collective action. Developers solve their own problems while freely sharing innovations without capturing private returns, creating public goods. This private-collective model offers society advantages of both approaches and raises new research questions for organization science. The authors provide guidance on accessing open source project data and conducting empirical studies.
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Beyond high tech: early adopters of open innovation in other industries
Open innovation—where companies source ideas from outside their organization and commercialize internal ideas externally—has been studied mainly in high-tech industries. This paper identifies early adopters of open innovation in non-tech sectors, showing that open innovation practices work across traditional and mature industries. The authors document successful adoption practices and clarify that open innovation does not simply mean outsourcing R&D.
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Regional Innovation Systems, Clusters, and the Knowledge Economy
This paper defines regional innovation systems and establishes criteria for identifying them in practice. It argues that Europe lags behind the United States in innovation because European governments over-rely on public intervention, indicating market failure. The paper calls for European public innovation support systems to evolve while private sector institutions strengthen their organizational capacity.
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Airbnb: disruptive innovation and the rise of an informal tourism accommodation sector
Airbnb represents a disruptive innovation that leverages internet technology to enable homeowners to rent residences as tourist accommodation. The platform offers cost savings, household amenities, and authentic local experiences that appeal to mainstream consumers despite lacking traditional hotel attributes. The paper examines regulatory challenges, tax concerns, and Airbnb's potential to transform the accommodation sector with both positive and negative destination impacts.
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Absorptive capacity: Valuing a reconceptualization
This paper critiques and refines the concept of absorptive capacity—a firm's ability to recognize, assimilate, and apply external knowledge. The authors identify gaps in a previous reconceptualization and propose improvements: redefining how organizations recognize valuable knowledge, clarifying transformation processes, distinguishing potential from realized capacity, emphasizing socialization's role, accounting for power dynamics, and incorporating feedback loops into a dynamic model.
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Open R&D and open innovation: exploring the phenomenon
Open innovation—where organizations combine internal and external knowledge for R&D—has become strategically important. Research shows three main processes: outside-in (acquiring external knowledge), inside-out (sharing internal knowledge), and coupled approaches. The paper argues that organizations must understand where open innovation creates value and adapt their R&D management methods accordingly, considering strategic, organizational, and business implications.
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Social Networks, the <i>Tertius Iungens</i> Orientation, and Involvement in Innovation
This study examines how people's social network positions and behaviors influence their involvement in organizational innovation. The research finds that individuals who actively connect disconnected colleagues and facilitate coordination between already-connected people—a "tertius iungens" orientation—are more likely to drive innovation. Dense networks and diverse social knowledge also predict innovation involvement. The findings challenge structural holes theory by showing that connecting people benefits innovation more than exploiting network gaps for personal advantage.
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Orchestrating Innovation Networks
Hub firms actively orchestrate innovation networks by managing knowledge mobility, innovation appropriability, and network stability. Rather than treating network members as passive responders to incentives, this framework recognizes firms as dynamic agents that shape and are shaped by network structures. Orchestration enables value creation and extraction across loosely coupled autonomous firms without hierarchical control.
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The future of open innovation
Open innovation practices are gaining traction across organizations and research institutions. This overview synthesizes nine key perspectives needed to strengthen open innovation theory and examines recent evidence about how open innovation actually works in practice and organizational settings.
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Innovation in Innovation: The Triple Helix of University-Industry-Government Relations
Universities, industry, and government increasingly collaborate in a 'Triple Helix' model that drives innovation. Universities now actively commercialize knowledge and incubate technology firms. Companies invest in research and training as they advance technologically. Government functions as both entrepreneur and venture capitalist alongside its regulatory role. This interactive approach replaces linear innovation models, with institutions adopting each other's practices to create hybrid innovation ecosystems.
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Interfirm Collaboration Networks: The Impact of Large-Scale Network Structure on Firm Innovation
Firms embedded in alliance networks with both dense local clustering and broad reach—short average distances to many other firms—produce more patents than those in less-connected networks. The study tracked 1,106 firms across 11 industry alliance networks longitudinally, showing that network structure directly influences innovation output by balancing local cooperation with access to diverse knowledge sources.
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Open Innovation and Strategy
This paper examines open innovation as a strategic approach where organizations leverage external ideas and technologies alongside internal capabilities. The authors argue that open innovation models fundamentally reshape how companies develop and commercialize innovations, moving beyond traditional closed research and development practices to create value through collaborative networks and external partnerships.
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The Process of Innovation Assimilation by Firms in Different Countries: A Technology Diffusion Perspective on E-Business
This study examines how firms across 10 countries assimilate e-business innovations through three stages: initiation, adoption, and routinization. Competition drives early adoption but hinders effective implementation. Large firms gain advantages initially but face structural barriers later. Regulatory environments matter more in developing countries, while technology readiness dominates there and technology integration dominates in developed economies, showing how innovation assimilation shifts with economic context.
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Integrating Models of Diffusion of Innovations: A Conceptual Framework
This paper develops a conceptual framework for understanding how innovations spread by organizing diffusion research variables into three components: innovation characteristics (public/private consequences, benefits/costs), adopter characteristics (familiarity, status, networks, personal qualities), and environmental context (geography, culture, politics, global uniformity). The framework emphasizes how these variables interact and gate adoption decisions, affecting the speed at which different actors adopt innovations.
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PERSPECTIVE—Absorbing the Concept of Absorptive Capacity: How to Realize Its Potential in the Organization Field
This paper reviews twenty years of research on absorptive capacity—an organization's ability to recognize, assimilate, and apply new knowledge. The authors identify major gaps in existing literature: most studies focus on tangible outcomes while neglecting organizational design and individual-level factors. They propose an integrative model showing how individual, organizational, and inter-organizational factors work together across multiple levels to influence innovation and firm performance, and call for research bridging micro and macro antecedents.
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Network function virtualization: Challenges and opportunities for innovations
Network function virtualization decouples software from hardware by running network functions on commercial servers instead of specialized equipment. This approach accelerates service deployment and reduces costs, but creates challenges around performance guarantees, dynamic resource management, and efficient placement of virtual network functions. The paper outlines NFV architecture, use cases, and research priorities.
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SHIFTING INNOVATION TO USERS VIA TOOLKITS
Manufacturers traditionally invest heavily in understanding user needs before developing products, but this approach struggles as needs change rapidly and markets fragment. Toolkits for user innovation offer an alternative: manufacturers provide tools that let users develop customized products themselves. Evidence from pioneering fields shows this approach delivers custom products faster and cheaper than traditional development methods.
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Challenges of open innovation: the paradox of firm investment in open-source software
Firms face three core challenges when pursuing open innovation: exploiting internal innovations, integrating external innovations, and motivating outsiders to contribute. The authors examine how software firms resolve these challenges through four strategies: pooled R&D, spinouts, selling complements, and attracting donated complements. These approaches show how companies can invest in shared intellectual property while maintaining competitive advantage, with lessons applicable across industries.
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From Creativity to Innovation: The Social Network Drivers of the Four Phases of the Idea Journey
Social networks influence innovation differently across four distinct phases: idea generation, elaboration, championing, and implementation. Each phase requires different network characteristics—cognitive flexibility, support, influence, and shared vision respectively. Network features beneficial in one phase become detrimental in another. Successful innovators navigate this paradox by reframing their approach and activating different network strengths at appropriate moments, moving ideas from conception to tangible field-changing outcomes.
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Absorptive Capacity Configurations in Supply Chains: Gearing for Partner-Enabled Market Knowledge Creation1
Supply chain partners create market knowledge by sharing information through interlinked processes and IT infrastructure. This study identifies five distinct partnership configurations—collectors, connectors, crunchers, coercers, and collaborators—based on their absorptive capacity and capability platforms. The configurations differ in how they acquire, assimilate, and exploit partner knowledge to drive innovation and operational efficiency. Rich information sharing and coordination mechanisms determine success in partner-enabled knowledge creation.
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Triple Helix, Quadruple Helix and Quintuple Helix and How Do Knowledge, Innovation and the Environment Relate To Each Other?
This paper introduces the Quintuple Helix framework, expanding on earlier Triple and Quadruple Helix models. It integrates universities, industry, government, media/culture, and the natural environment into a unified system for understanding knowledge and innovation. The framework positions eco-innovation and eco-entrepreneurship within sustainable development and social ecology, showing how environmental considerations must shape innovation policy and practice.
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Building Dynamic Capabilities: Innovation Driven by Individual-, Firm-, and Network-Level Effects
This study examines how innovation emerges from individual, firm, and network-level factors simultaneously. Using 22 years of pharmaceutical and biotechnology data, the authors find that innovation drivers exist across all three levels and can either substitute for each other or reinforce one another. The research challenges the assumption that different analytical levels operate independently, showing instead that they interact to shape innovative output.
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The open innovation research landscape: established perspectives and emerging themes across different levels of analysis
This paper reviews open innovation research across organizational, inter-organizational, and ecosystem levels of analysis. The authors identify established perspectives and emerging themes, arguing that future research must integrate insights across multiple analytical levels rather than studying open innovation in isolation. They propose new research categories and cross-domain questions to advance the field.
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Innovation Contests, Open Innovation, and Multiagent Problem Solving
Innovation contests let firms post problems to independent solvers and reward the best solution. The paper shows that larger solver populations benefit firms through solution diversity, offsetting reduced individual effort. Performance-contingent awards further improve outcomes compared to fixed prizes. The analysis identifies which product types and cost structures gain most from contests versus internal innovation.
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A Longitudinal Study of the Influence of Alliance Network Structure and Composition on Firm Exploratory Innovation
A longitudinal study of 77 telecommunications equipment manufacturers shows that firms with technologically diverse alliance partners generate more exploratory innovation. When a firm's partners are also connected to each other (network closure), this diversity effect strengthens. The research demonstrates that firms can simultaneously benefit from both access to diverse information and tightly connected networks to drive innovation.
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Ambidexterity in Technology Sourcing: The Moderating Role of Absorptive Capacity
Manufacturing firms perform best when balancing internal technology development with external sourcing, following an inverted U-shaped relationship. However, a firm's absorptive capacity—its ability to recognize and integrate external knowledge—moderates this effect. Companies with stronger absorptive capacity gain greater performance benefits from balanced technology sourcing strategies than those with weaker capacity.
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Triple Helix Systems: An Analytical Framework for Innovation Policy and Practice in the Knowledge Society
This paper develops the Triple Helix framework—university, industry, and government interactions—into a formal systems model for analyzing innovation. It identifies key components including R&D and non-R&D innovators, hybrid institutions, and individual actors. Five relationship types (technology transfer, collaboration, leadership, substitution, networking) connect these components across knowledge, innovation, and consensus spaces. The framework reveals how knowledge and resources circulate within regional innovation systems and identifies blockages that impede innovation.
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Open Innovation: Research, Practices, and Policies
Open innovation has become central to academic research, business practice, and policy decisions. This article surveys the current state of open innovation across these domains, examining key trends like digital transformation and challenges such as uncertainty. The authors discuss potential solutions including EU funding programs and introduce selected papers from the World Open Innovation Conference that address these issues.
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Social Media, Knowledge Sharing, and Innovation: Toward a Theory of Communication Visibility
Enterprise social networking sites increase communication visibility within organizations, allowing employees to see others' messages and network connections. This visibility enhances metaknowledge—understanding who knows what and whom. Workers then learn vicariously from colleagues, recombine ideas more effectively, avoid duplicating efforts, and proactively aggregate information. These changes lead to more innovative products and services in knowledge-economy work.
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Finding Commercially Attractive User Innovations: A Test of Lead‐User Theory<sup>*</sup>
This study tests lead-user theory by analyzing kite-surfing enthusiasts who modified equipment. The researchers found that both key components of lead-user theory—high expected benefits and being ahead of trends—independently predict which user innovations become commercially attractive products. Adding measures of users' local resources further improved identification of valuable innovations. The findings confirm lead-user theory's core principles and provide practical guidance for firms seeking to commercialize user-developed innovations.
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Digital product innovation within four classes of innovation networks
Digital technologies reshape how innovation networks create and share knowledge by reducing communication costs, increasing connectivity, and accelerating convergence across diverse participants. The authors identify four types of digitally-enabled innovation networks—project, clan, federated, and anarchic—each requiring different approaches to knowledge sharing and integration. Digital infrastructures support these networks through representational flexibility, semantic coherence, traceability, knowledge brokering, and linguistic calibration.
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Brokerage, Boundary Spanning, and Leadership in Open Innovation Communities
Leaders in open innovation communities need strong technical skills first, then must integrate their communities to prevent fragmentation. Two social positions enable this: brokers who connect disparate groups, and boundary spanners who link different technological areas. Boundary spanners advance to leadership more readily than brokers because they avoid the trust deficits brokers face, though physical interaction can help brokers overcome this disadvantage. The study tracked careers in the Internet Engineering Task Force from 1986 to 2002.
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Disruptive Innovation: An Intellectual History and Directions for Future Research
This paper reviews the intellectual history of disruptive innovation theory, showing how the concept has been misunderstood by practitioners and inconsistently engaged by researchers. The authors trace how the theory evolved from a narrow technology-change framework into a broader causal theory of innovation and competitive response. They identify gaps in empirical research and propose three underexplored areas—response strategies, performance trajectories, and innovation metrics—to guide future academic work.
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Diffusion Of Innovations Theory, Principles, And Practice
This paper explains diffusion of innovations theory and how it applies to healthcare. The authors identify key parameters of how innovations spread, clarify relationships between diffusion and related processes like implementation and scale-up, and provide principles for designing interventions. They address why beneficial healthcare innovations fail to spread quickly despite their merit.
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Microfoundations of Internal and External Absorptive Capacity Routines
Organizations develop absorptive capacity—the ability to learn from and apply new knowledge—through specific internal and external routines. This paper identifies how firms balance creating knowledge internally with acquiring and assimilating external knowledge. The authors argue that successful early adopters of innovations implement complementary configurations of these routines, while most firms remain imitators because they fail to develop the right combination of organizational practices.
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Regional Innovation Systems: Theory, Empirics and Policy
This paper synthesizes theory and evidence on regional innovation systems, examining how regions develop competitive advantage through innovation networks. The authors identify three core questions: the nature of regional systems themselves, the boundaries between industrial clusters and knowledge transfer mechanisms, and the role of labor markets in facilitating learning. The work reveals gaps in current understanding and proposes directions for future research on how regions can address inequality through innovation policy.
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Explicating Open Innovation: Clarifying an Emerging Paradigm for Understanding Innovation
This paper clarifies the open innovation paradigm, defining it as a distributed innovation process involving purposively managed knowledge flows across organizational boundaries using both monetary and non-monetary mechanisms aligned with business models. The authors review academic literature since 2003, address critiques and divergent views on open innovation, and extend the research agenda by identifying new subjects and units of analysis for future investigation.
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Detailed Review of Rogers' Diffusion of Innovations Theory and Educational Technology-Related Studies Based on Rogers' Theory.
Rogers' Diffusion of Innovations theory provides a widely-used framework for understanding how new innovations spread and get adopted across different fields. This review examines Rogers' model and its application in educational technology research over three decades, showing how the theory has shaped studies in political science, public health, communications, history, economics, technology, and education.
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Disruptive innovation for social change.
Catalytic innovation—simpler, cheaper solutions targeting underserved populations—drives social change more effectively than complex offerings. Unlike traditional disruptive innovation, catalytic innovations prioritize social impact through scaling and replication. They succeed by meeting unmet needs with good-enough alternatives that incumbents initially dismiss. Examples across healthcare, education, and economic development show both nonprofits and for-profits deploying this approach to reach broader populations than conventional organizations.
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Innovation Diffusion in Heterogeneous Populations: Contagion, Social Influence, and Social Learning
This paper develops theoretical models explaining how new ideas and products spread through populations with different characteristics. The author examines three diffusion mechanisms—contagion, social influence, and social learning—and shows each creates a distinct pattern in adoption curves. Using historical data on hybrid corn adoption, the paper demonstrates how to empirically distinguish between these diffusion mechanisms and provides tools for analyzing innovation spread in heterogeneous groups.
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Knowledge Networks, Collaboration Networks, and Exploratory Innovation
Innovation depends on two distinct networks within firms: collaboration networks between researchers and knowledge networks linking knowledge elements. Using patent data from a microprocessor manufacturer, the study finds that structural holes in collaboration networks boost exploratory innovation, while structural holes in knowledge networks reduce it. Moderate centrality in knowledge networks maximizes exploration, but high centrality in collaboration networks decreases it. The two networks shape where researchers search for new discoveries.
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Managing Open Innovation
Industrial innovation increasingly relies on external knowledge sources and market channels, creating uncertainty in evaluating early-stage projects. Companies typically minimize false positives but neglect false negatives, losing potential value. New metrics can help firms better leverage external innovation sources and capture value from rejected projects through alternative business models.
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Network Innovation using OpenFlow: A Survey
This survey examines OpenFlow, the leading Software Defined Networking technology that separates network control from data forwarding. OpenFlow enables researchers to test new networking ideas in production environments through software-based controllers managing switch behavior. The paper reviews OpenFlow capabilities including traffic analysis and dynamic rule updates, describes applications in network management and data center virtualization, discusses existing research infrastructures, and identifies challenges for large-scale deployment.
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Wakes of Innovation in Project Networks: The Case of Digital 3-D Representations in Architecture, Engineering, and Construction
When architect Frank Gehry adopted digital 3-D representations in construction projects, it triggered cascading innovations across multiple firms and communities involved in building. The new technology created separate innovation paths within different groups, enabled knowledge-sharing between them, and allowed innovations to spread across the entire project network. This demonstrates how changes in shared digital tools can spark unpredictable waves of innovation in complex, distributed systems.
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Innovation ecosystems and the pace of substitution: Re‐examining technology S‐curves
This paper explains why some new technologies rapidly replace older ones while others take decades to gain traction. The authors develop a framework examining both competing technologies and their surrounding ecosystems. They identify four distinct patterns based on how easily new technology ecosystems can emerge and how much old technology ecosystems can extend. Analysis of ten technology transitions in semiconductor lithography equipment from 1972 to 2009 confirms their predictions about substitution speed.
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Closed or open innovation? Problem solving and the governance choice
Open and closed innovation represent distinct governance structures with different costs and benefits. The authors argue that innovation problems should be matched to appropriate governance forms based on problem type. They identify four open innovation models—markets, partnerships, contests, and user communities—and compare them with two closed forms: authority-based and consensus-based hierarchies. Each governance form uses different communication channels, incentives, and property rights mechanisms.
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Open Innovation: Where We've Been and Where We're Going
Open innovation, introduced in 2003, represents a shift in how companies approach industrial innovation by incorporating external ideas and partnerships. The concept has gained widespread adoption across academic research and business practice. This review examines the evolution of open innovation thinking and projects its future direction in organizational innovation strategies.
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Entrepreneurship in Innovation Ecosystems: Entrepreneurs’ Self–Regulatory Processes and Their Implications for New Venture Success
Entrepreneurs operating within innovation ecosystems face competing demands between ecosystem leaders' goals and their own venture objectives. This paper examines how entrepreneurs' self-regulatory processes help them navigate and balance these conflicting priorities to achieve new venture success.
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Applying Diffusion of Innovation Theory to Intervention Development
Diffusion of Innovation Theory provides a robust framework for designing social work interventions that spread effectively. The author reviews seven key concepts—intervention attributes, clusters, demonstration projects, societal sectors, contextual conditions, opinion leadership, and adaptation—that accelerate adoption of evidence-based practices. By applying diffusion principles during intervention design rather than after implementation, social work can increase both internal validity and real-world spread of innovations.
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Social Capital and the Diffusion of Innovations Within Organizations: The Case of Computer Technology in Schools
This study examines how computer technology spreads within schools, finding that social capital—informal access to expertise and responsiveness to peer pressure—drives implementation as much as individual beliefs about the innovation's value. Teachers in schools share common goals and social systems that enable them to help each other and influence adoption decisions. Change agents promoting educational innovations should focus on building and leveraging these local social relationships.
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Absorptive Capacity and Information Systems Research: Review, Synthesis, and Directions for Future Research1
This paper reviews how absorptive capacity—a firm's ability to identify, assimilate, transform, and apply external knowledge—has been used in information systems research. The authors find inconsistent conceptualizations, measurement approaches, and applications across IS studies. They trace the construct's evolution in organizational literature, clarify its relationship to organizational learning, and provide a framework to help IS researchers apply absorptive capacity more effectively when studying information technology's organizational role.
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Widespread contribution of transposable elements to the innovation of gene regulatory networks
This paper is not about rural innovation. It is a molecular biology study examining how transposable elements contribute to the evolution of gene regulatory networks in mammals. The authors mapped transcription factor binding sites across human and mouse cell lines and found that transposable elements account for approximately 20% of these binding sites, with significant variation across different transcription factors. They conclude that transposable elements have been a major driver of regulatory innovation during mammalian evolution.
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Organizational Absorptive Capacity and Responsiveness: An Empirical Investigation of Growth–Oriented SMEs
Growth-oriented small and medium-sized enterprises improve their organizational responsiveness by developing strong capabilities in acquiring external knowledge and sharing information internally. The study shows these relationships strengthen when firms adopt proactive strategies or operate in turbulent environments. Environmental conditions and strategic orientation significantly influence how effectively SMEs convert knowledge into responsive action.
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Prospects for developing absorptive capacity through internal information provision
Managers can develop organizational absorptive capacity by distributing internal knowledge to employees considering new practices. The effectiveness of this information provision depends on what employees already know. Prior experience with related practices strengthens the impact of managerial information, while existing knowledge from other sources or past events weakens it. This clarifies when absorptive capacity creates lasting competitive advantage.
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The influence of supply network structure on firm innovation
This study examines how supply network structure affects firm innovation in the electronics industry. Using social network analysis on 390 firms, the researchers found that firms with greater supply network accessibility and interconnectedness produce more innovation. A firm's ability to absorb knowledge and its partners' innovativeness further strengthen these effects. The findings show that embedded network relationships directly influence how knowledge and information flow through supply networks to drive innovation.
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Collaborative networked organisations and customer communities: value co-creation and co-innovation in the networking era
Collaborative networked organizations and virtual customer communities drive value creation and innovation by pooling complementary skills, knowledge, and technologies across networks. These strategic alliances enhance flexibility and adaptability to market changes and customer needs. The paper reviews value co-creation and co-innovation concepts and proposes a framework for 'experience-centric networks' that connect organizations with customer communities to enable sustainable, user-driven collaborative innovation.
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Getting Clear About Communities in Open Innovation
This paper examines how researchers define and use the concept of 'community' across open source software, user innovation, and open innovation studies. The authors review existing definitions of community—both stated and unstated—and identify gaps in how scholars apply this construct. They argue that clearer, more consistent definitions are needed to make research across these fields comparable and to guide future investigation.
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Strategic Management of Open Innovation: A Dynamic Capabilities Perspective
This paper applies dynamic capabilities theory to explain how organizations strategically manage open innovation. The authors argue that understanding open innovation's benefits and limitations requires a strategic management lens. They develop a framework showing how dynamic capabilities help explain both success and failure in open innovation initiatives, drawing on papers presented at the World Open Innovation Conference.
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On open innovation, platforms, and entrepreneurship
Open innovation and digital platforms have fundamentally transformed entrepreneurship across industries. These shifts create new opportunities for entrepreneurs to innovate and capture value, from supplying inputs to established firms to operating as complementors on platforms. The paper identifies key factors that enable or constrain these entrepreneurial opportunities and emphasizes how regulatory policies, digitization, and globalization shape emerging business models.
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Innovation, Openness, and Platform Control
This paper develops a mathematical model to determine optimal platform openness and intellectual property duration for business ecosystems. The authors show that closing platforms increases sponsor revenue but limits developer innovation, while longer IP protection increases developer earnings but delays public access to innovations. The model identifies trade-offs between these competing interests and provides guidance for platform strategy, organizational design, and regulatory policy.
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OPEN VERSUS CLOSED INNOVATION: A MODEL OF DISCOVERY AND DIVERGENCE.
Open innovation enables firms to discover product feature combinations that closed innovation misses. However, when partners have conflicting goals, open innovation limits the firm's control over technological direction. The optimal innovation approach depends on balancing discovery benefits against coordination costs from partner divergence.
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The Disruptive Nature of Information Technology Innovations: The Case of Internet Computing in Systems Development Organizations1, 2
This paper develops a theoretical model of disruptive IT innovations and applies it to Internet computing adoption. The authors studied eight systems development organizations in the United States and Finland, finding that Internet computing fundamentally transformed their development processes and service offerings. The research shows how architectural innovations in computing technology create cascading changes across organizational practices and outcomes.
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Consumer adoption of the Uber mobile application: Insights from diffusion of innovation theory and technology acceptance model
This study examines why consumers adopt Uber by combining two adoption theories: Diffusion of Innovation and Technology Acceptance Model. The research finds that relative advantage, compatibility, complexity, observability, and social influence significantly affect how useful and easy users perceive the app to be, which then shapes their attitudes and intention to use it. The findings integrate both theoretical frameworks to explain mobile app adoption in the sharing economy.
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The ecosystem as helix: an exploratory theory‐building study of regional co‐opetitive entrepreneurial ecosystems as Quadruple/Quintuple Helix Innovation Models
This paper develops a theoretical framework for understanding regional innovation ecosystems using the Quadruple/Quintuple Helix model, which integrates government, universities, industry, civil society, and environmental actors. The authors argue that regions function as complex, multi-level systems where organizations pursue both competitive and cooperative goals through entrepreneurial activities. They conceptualize these ecosystems as fractal structures with dynamic assets and propose that innovation systems can be organized by geographical and research-based properties.
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Value Creation and Value Capture in Open Innovation
Open innovation research has focused on collaborative invention but neglected how actors create and capture value from these collaborations. This paper argues that understanding value creation and capture is essential for sustaining open innovation and gaining competitive advantage. The authors clarify conceptual confusion around value capture and propose a framework linking open innovation to value creation and capture processes among interdependent actors.
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Living Labs as Open-Innovation Networks
Living labs function as open-innovation networks that help organizations understand user needs and develop business opportunities. These collaborative environments create competitive advantages by enabling companies to co-create solutions with users in real-world settings, emerging as a practical approach for innovation development that goes beyond traditional research methods.
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Expanding Access to Hepatitis C Virus Treatment—Extension for Community Healthcare Outcomes (ECHO) Project: Disruptive Innovation in Specialty Care†
The ECHO Model uses telehealth technology and case-based learning to train primary care providers in rural and underserved areas to deliver specialty care for hepatitis C virus. Participating clinicians gained significant knowledge, self-efficacy, and professional satisfaction. The program successfully expanded access to complex medical care in communities lacking specialty services and built sustainable local capacity.
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Diffusion of Engineering Education Innovations: A Survey of Awareness and Adoption Rates in U.S. Engineering Departments
Engineering education innovations spread slowly despite decades of improvement efforts. A survey of U.S. engineering department chairs found 82 percent awareness but only 47 percent adoption of seven established innovations. Student-active pedagogies saw the highest adoption. Word-of-mouth and presentations proved more effective than publications for spreading awareness. Department chairs cited limited funding, faculty time constraints, and concerns about learning outcomes as key barriers to adoption.
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Local Nodes in Global Networks: The Geography of Knowledge Flows in Biotechnology Innovation
This study examines how biotechnology firms in Canada innovate by analyzing knowledge flows from both local and global sources. The research finds that successful innovation depends on firms' internal technological capabilities and their ability to absorb external knowledge. While global networks matter significantly for innovation, local relationships prove especially critical for raising capital. The findings challenge the assumption that local networks alone drive innovation, showing instead that dynamic regions combine dense local interaction with strong international connections.
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Surmountable Chasms: Networks and Social Innovation for Resilient Systems
Networks facilitate social innovation by enabling cross-scale interactions that help communities escape rigid social structures and address complex problems. The paper argues that successful networks require institutional entrepreneurs with specific skills: pattern generation, relationship building, brokering knowledge and resources, and network recharging. These capabilities allow networks to increase resilience and improve human capacity to respond to systemic challenges.
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The role of venture capital firms in Silicon Valley's complex innovation network
Venture capital firms play five critical roles in Silicon Valley's innovation network: financing startups, selecting promising companies, facilitating collective learning, embedding firms within the ecosystem, and signaling quality to other investors. These functions create a robust system of interconnected economic agents—universities, large companies, laboratories, and startups—that explains Silicon Valley's sustained innovative success over seventy years and why other regions have failed to replicate it.
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Socially and Environmentally Responsible Value Chain Innovations: New Operations Management Research Opportunities
This paper identifies new research opportunities in operations management focused on socially and environmentally responsible value chains. The authors argue that OM research should expand beyond traditional economic objectives to address environmental and social responsibility across emerging and developing economies, engaging diverse stakeholders including producers, consumers, governments, and nonprofits. The paper proposes this broader approach will advance both economic development and social well-being globally.
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Explaining Diffusion Patterns for Complex Health Care Innovations
Healthcare innovations spread unevenly regardless of scientific evidence quality. This study examines four cases to show that adoption depends on how benefits and risks align with the interests, values, and power structures of the healthcare system adopting them, not on the strength of scientific support alone.
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Open-market innovation.
Companies increasingly adopt open-market innovation, using licensing, joint ventures, and strategic alliances to access external ideas rather than relying solely on internal R&D. This approach lets firms acquire diverse expertise, retain creative talent, and measure innovation value. However, poor deal structuring can backfire, as seen when Xerox and TRW failed to capitalize on their own innovations.
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Disruptiveness of innovations: measurement and an assessment of reliability and validity
This paper develops and validates a measurement scale for assessing how disruptive innovations are. The authors surveyed senior executives at 199 business units across 38 Fortune 500 companies and used statistical analysis to confirm their scale is reliable and valid. They show that disruptiveness is distinct from other innovation characteristics like radicalness, providing researchers with a tool to study why established companies struggle to develop truly disruptive innovations.
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Global production networks and the changing geography of innovation systems. Implications for developing countries
Globalization reshapes where innovation happens, creating opportunities for developing countries to access international knowledge through global production networks. The paper argues that developing nations can strengthen weak innovation systems by combining diverse knowledge sources and participating in global networks. This participation enables reverse knowledge outsourcing and industrial upgrading, but requires supportive public policies and institutions to capture these benefits effectively.
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The spread of innovations in social networks
This paper examines how network structure affects the speed at which innovations spread when people make strategic choices between competing alternatives. Using coordination game models, the authors find that innovations spread much more slowly on highly connected networks with long-range links than on low-dimensional networks based on geographic proximity. Their results contradict predictions from epidemic models commonly used to study innovation diffusion.
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Open innovation: current status and research opportunities
Open innovation has grown rapidly as a research field since 2003. This paper identifies key gaps in existing research, including the need for more work on outbound innovation, services, network collaboration forms like ecosystems and platforms, and adoption by small and nonprofit organizations. It calls for better measurement of open innovation's performance effects and understanding of why initiatives fail, plus stronger connections to established theories like absorptive capacity and dynamic capabilities.
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Navigating the Back Loop: Fostering Social Innovation and Transformation in Ecosystem Management
This paper examines how social innovation drives transformation in ecosystem management. The authors argue that fostering innovation during periods of ecosystem change—particularly in the 'back loop' of adaptive cycles—enables communities to develop new management approaches and adapt to shifting environmental conditions. The work emphasizes social innovation as essential for navigating complex ecosystem challenges.
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Orchestration Processes in Network-Centric Innovation: Evidence From the Field.
Companies increasingly pursue innovation through external networks rather than internal resources alone. This study examines how hub firms orchestrate network-centric innovation by combining product development and network theory with field research. The findings show that orchestration processes blend innovation design with network design, revealing how firms coordinate external partnerships to drive innovation.
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Incubation of incubators: innovation as a triple helix of university-industry-government networks
University business incubators have evolved from isolated entities into networked innovation hubs where universities, industry, and government collaborate. These incubators transform research into new products and firms by combining R&D resources across sectors. Government funding and regulatory changes enable this triple-helix model, shifting innovation from linear knowledge transfer to interactive, collaborative development.
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Innovating Pedagogy 2015: Open University Innovation Report 4
This report identifies ten emerging pedagogical innovations with potential to transform post-secondary education. Researchers at the Open University and SRI International reviewed educational theories and practices, then selected innovations already in use but not yet widely adopted. The report sketches these ten pedagogies in order of likely implementation timescale, aiming to guide teachers and policymakers toward productive educational change.
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Open mHealth Architecture: An Engine for Health Care Innovation
Standardized interfaces and shared components in mobile health technology are essential for advancing healthcare delivery and research. The paper argues that an open architecture approach enables innovation by allowing different systems and devices to work together effectively, unlocking the full potential of mobile-enabled healthcare.
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Non-invasive prenatal testing for aneuploidy and beyond: challenges of responsible innovation in prenatal screening
This position document from European and American genetics societies provides recommendations for responsible innovation in prenatal screening using non-invasive prenatal testing (NIPT). The authors argue that while NIPT improves accuracy and safety for detecting common chromosomal abnormalities, expanding screening scope requires rigorous validation and ethical evaluation. They call for governments to regulate prenatal screening as public health programs, ensuring quality counseling, professional education, and equitable access rather than allowing commercial expansion without oversight.
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When Is a Disruptive Innovation Disruptive?<sup>*</sup>
This paper distinguishes between market-disrupting innovations and disruptive innovations as defined by Christensen, using diffusion patterns to explain why incumbents sometimes underestimate threats. The authors identify low-end encroachment (fringe-market, detached-market, and immediate scenarios) where innovations spread upward from low-end markets, and high-end encroachment where impact is immediate. They provide a three-step framework to assess diffusion patterns and help firms evaluate innovation threats or opportunities.
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Implementing Open Innovation in the Public Sector: The Case of Challenge.gov
The Obama administration launched Challenge.gov to bring open innovation practices from the private sector into federal government. The platform crowdsources solutions to complex public problems by tapping external problem solvers and collective intelligence. The paper examines how the General Services Administration implemented this crowdsourcing approach, documenting the change management process and lessons learned for designing open innovation in government agencies.
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Unpacking Absorptive Capacity: A Study of Knowledge Utilization from Alliance Portfolios
This study examines how firms use knowledge from their alliance networks during technological change. The researchers distinguish between two types of absorptive capacity: latitudinal (using diverse knowledge) and longitudinal (using distant knowledge). They find that moderate diversity in alliance portfolios optimizes knowledge use, but simultaneously increasing demands on both types of capacity reduces effectiveness. The paper identifies two portfolio strategies—telescopic and panoptic searches—that balance these trade-offs.
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Absorptive capacity: Enhancing the assimilation of time‐based manufacturing practices
Organizations implementing advanced manufacturing technologies need strong absorptive capacity—an internal environment that emphasizes knowledge sharing and continuous learning. This study measures absorptive capacity and tests its impact on adopting time-based manufacturing practices. Results from 303 manufacturers show that higher absorptive capacity directly strengthens adoption of innovative practices, which in turn increases customer value.
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Social Innovation: Integrating Micro, Meso, and Macro Level Insights From Institutional Theory
Social innovations require renegotiating or building institutions to address complex social problems involving multiple systems and actors. This paper presents a three-cycle model showing how social innovation operates across micro, meso, and macro levels through agentic, relational, and situated dynamics. The framework integrates institutional theory perspectives to guide understanding of how innovative solutions develop and get implemented across interconnected social systems.
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National Innovation System
This paper traces the intellectual origins of the National Innovation System framework, showing that the OECD's work in the 1960s fundamentally shaped the systems approach to innovation that later researchers like Freeman, Nelson, and Lundvall developed. The author argues the OECD's emphasis on interconnected sectors—government, university, and industry—and their relationships as drivers of innovation performance directly influenced the framework that became central to innovation studies.
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Interstate Professional Associations and the Diffusion of Policy Innovations
Interstate professional associations accelerate policy innovation adoption across states. The author examines how state insurance commissioners participating in the National Association of Insurance Commissioners' committee on health insurance were significantly more likely to adopt the HMO Model Act. The study demonstrates that professional associations, particularly through their committee structures, create institutional pathways that facilitate state officials' adoption of policy innovations.
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Managing Distributed Innovation: Strategic Utilization of Open and User Innovation
Innovation increasingly happens across multiple organizations and stakeholders rather than within single firms. This paper compares vertically integrated innovation against open innovation, user innovation, crowdsourcing, and co-creation models. It examines how these distributed approaches differ in their sources, motivations, and value capture mechanisms, then provides a framework for strategically managing innovation across organizational boundaries.
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An Examination of the Relationship Between Absorptive Capacity and Organizational Learning, and a Proposed Integration
This paper clarifies the relationship between absorptive capacity and organizational learning, two concepts long studied together but never precisely defined in relation to each other. The authors argue that absorptive capacity—an organization's ability to recognize, assimilate, and apply external knowledge—represents a specific type of organizational learning focused on external knowledge acquisition. They propose integrating these concepts using established frameworks from organizational learning and absorptive capacity literature.
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Disentangling Diffusion: The Effects of Social Learning and Economic Competition on State Policy Innovation and Expansion
This paper examines how states adopt and expand Indian gaming policies, distinguishing between two diffusion mechanisms: social learning and economic competition. The authors find that social learning drives initial policy adoption while economic competition influences both adoption and subsequent policy expansion. They develop new statistical methods to track policy extent over time rather than just first adoption timing, demonstrating that different diffusion processes operate differently across policy areas.
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Using users: When does external knowledge enhance corporate product innovation?
User knowledge significantly enhances corporate product innovation, particularly in new technology areas and radical innovations. The study examined medical device companies collaborating with innovative physicians and found that these user collaborations generate stronger innovation outcomes than relying solely on external knowledge from other firms or universities.
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Citizen Participation, Open Innovation, and Crowdsourcing
Open innovation and crowdsourcing offer planning practitioners new approaches to problem-solving by engaging external participants and diverse groups. Unlike traditional citizen participation, crowdsourcing uses internet-based challenges to generate solutions from large audiences. The paper examines how these techniques differ and presents case studies demonstrating crowdsourcing's potential to produce more robust outcomes than internal organizational efforts.
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How do young firms manage product portfolio complexity? The role of absorptive capacity and ambidexterity
Young high-technology firms benefit from complex product portfolios through increased sales and competitiveness, but face rising costs that create diminishing returns. The study of 215 young firms shows that absorptive capacity and ambidexterity—the ability to balance exploration and exploitation—strengthen performance gains from portfolio complexity while reducing its costs.
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Disrupting Class How Disruptive Innovation Will Change the Way the World Learns
This paper applies disruptive innovation theory to education, arguing that technological change will fundamentally transform how people learn globally. The author examines how disruptive innovations reshape educational systems and delivery methods, suggesting that new technologies will create alternative learning pathways that challenge traditional classroom-based education models.
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Dismantling Knowledge Boundaries at NASA: The Critical Role of Professional Identity in Open Innovation
A study of NASA's adoption of open innovation reveals that R&D professionals traditionally protect knowledge within disciplinary boundaries. When NASA opened innovation to outside contributors, it achieved scientific breakthroughs with limited resources, but professionals who resisted identity change rejected external solutions. Only those who refocused their professional identity truly dismantled boundaries and integrated outside knowledge. Professional identity transformation proved essential for open innovation to succeed.
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The effect of social networking sites and absorptive capacity on SMES’ innovation performance
Social networking sites significantly enhance SME innovation performance by facilitating knowledge acquisition and absorption from external actors. The study analyzed 215 small and medium enterprises across knowledge-intensive and labor-intensive sectors globally, using statistical modeling to measure relationships between social media use, absorptive capacity, and innovation outcomes. Results show that enterprises leveraging social platforms to interact with customers, institutions, and competitors effectively absorb external knowledge and generate stronger innovation performance.
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Open innovation in the public sector of leading countries
The study examines how leading governments adopt open innovation practices. The USA, Australia, and Singapore developed national open innovation policies that created positive climates for innovation projects, particularly online platforms. While outside-in approaches dominate, governments increasingly explore inside-out strategies to leverage public data. Most governments remain in early adoption stages and need strategic plans to integrate open innovation into workplace practices.
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The Innovation Effect of User Design: Exploring Consumers’ Innovation Perceptions of Firms Selling Products Designed by Users
Firms that involve users in designing products enhance consumer perceptions of innovation compared to traditional professional design. Four studies show this user-design approach increases purchase intentions, willingness to pay, and recommendation likelihood. The effect strengthens when more diverse consumers participate, face fewer constraints, and actually use their designs. Consumer familiarity with user innovation and task complexity moderate these outcomes.
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A generative co-design framework for healthcare innovation: development and application of an end-user engagement framework
This paper presents a three-phase co-design framework for healthcare innovation that actively involves healthcare workers and patients in designing health systems and services. The authors developed and tested the framework on a virtual healthcare project for children with chronic conditions, demonstrating that end-users can contribute practical knowledge and creative insights to shape improvements. The framework guides innovators through pre-design, co-design, and post-design phases to ensure new healthcare solutions meet real user needs.
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GENI - global environment for network innovations
GENI is the National Science Foundation's infrastructure initiative to advance network science and engineering research for future global communications. The project entered its first development phase with early prototyping underway, involving academic and industrial teams building software, hardware, and trial facilities to support innovative network research.
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Leveraging complexity for ecosystemic innovation
This paper analyzes innovation ecosystems through complexity science, treating them as open non-linear networks where multiple actors collaborate and adapt to uncertainty. The authors distinguish innovation ecosystems from other business networks by their internal interaction complexity, review four research streams studying them, and apply complex adaptive systems theory to understand how innovation clusters function. They argue that ecosystem-based thinking better supports innovation-led economic growth than traditional industrial-era approaches.
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The Role of Organizational Absorptive Capacity in Strategic Use of Business Intelligence to Support Integrated Management Control Systems
This study examines how organizations absorb and use business intelligence systems within management control frameworks. The research finds that organizational absorptive capacity—the ability to gather, absorb, and leverage new information—is critical for successful BI implementation. While top management supports deployment, operational managers' absorptive capacity drives actual system use through bottom-up adoption rather than top-down mandates.
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Open source and journalism: toward new frameworks for imagining news innovation
Journalists and technologists collaborate globally through open-source software projects to innovate news production. The authors examine open-source culture's core values—transparency, tinkering, iteration, and participation—and evaluate how these principles align with or challenge traditional journalism practices. They argue open-source frameworks offer new ways to understand and advance innovation in newswork.
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Understanding the Advantages of Open Innovation Practices in Corporate Venturing in Terms of Real Options
Open innovation in corporate venturing offers financial and strategic advantages over closed innovation approaches. Companies gain early exposure to emerging technologies, can delay major financial commitments, exit unprofitable ventures quickly to limit losses, and extend promising ventures longer. However, firms must actively develop new skills and organizational routines to fully realize these real options benefits.
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Triple Helix twins: innovation and sustainability
The paper proposes adding a Sustainability Triple Helix model alongside the existing Innovation Triple Helix to address environmental and social dimensions. Rather than introducing a fourth helix that could weaken the model's creative dynamics, the authors suggest a complementary framework where universities, public institutions, and government collaborate on sustainability issues, while universities, industry, and government continue driving innovation.
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A new perspective on Twitter hashtag use: Diffusion of innovation theory
Twitter hashtags function as user-created tagging conventions that organize information around events and contexts. This paper applies diffusion of innovation theory to explain how hashtags are adopted and spread across the platform. The theory reveals insights for designing interfaces that support hashtag use and helps evaluate hashtag lifecycles to inform management decisions.
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Why organizations adopt information system process innovations: a longitudinal study using Diffusion of Innovation theory
This longitudinal study examines why organizations adopt information system process innovations across four decades and three organizational environments. Using Diffusion of Innovation theory, the researchers identify key adoption factors: user need recognition, technological infrastructure availability, past experience, trials, autonomous work, ease of use, learning by doing, and standards. However, many adoptions followed no clear pattern, suggesting additional unexplained influences on organizational innovation decisions.
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The Role of Policy Attributes in the Diffusion of Innovations
Policy characteristics significantly influence how quickly innovations spread across U.S. states. Analyzing 27 criminal justice policies adopted between 1973 and 2002, the authors found that attributes like relative advantage, complexity, and compatibility with existing practices determine adoption likelihood. These same attributes also shape whether policies spread through geographic proximity or through learning from other states' experiences.
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Enhancing effects of manufacturing flexibility through operational absorptive capacity and operational ambidexterity
Manufacturing flexibility improves firm performance in uncertain environments, but this effect depends on organizational capabilities. The study of 852 manufacturing firms shows that absorptive capacity—the ability to recognize and apply new knowledge—and ambidexterity—balancing exploitation of existing capabilities with exploration of new ones—both strengthen how flexibility translates uncertainty into better performance.
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Forty Years of Diffusion of Innovations: Utility and Value in Public Health
Rogers' Diffusion of Innovations model explains how new ideas spread through social systems via communication channels over time. Applied across thousands of studies spanning six decades, the model accounts for varying adoption rates and behavioral change. It has proven valuable for understanding how innovations—from agricultural technologies to public health interventions like HIV/AIDS prevention—take hold in populations.
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Aerospace Integrated Networks Innovation for Empowering 6G: A Survey and Future Challenges
This survey examines aerospace integrated networks combining satellites, high-altitude platforms, and unmanned aerial vehicles to deliver 6G connectivity. The authors analyze system architecture, networking design, and enabling technologies needed to manage these heterogeneous networks. They address network dynamics modeling, performance analysis, and optimization strategies to support diverse service demands across multi-tier aerial and terrestrial systems.
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A Fad or a Phenomenon?: The Adoption of Open Innovation Practices in Large Firms
This paper examines whether open innovation practices represent a lasting shift in how large firms operate or merely a temporary trend. The authors analyze adoption patterns across major companies to determine if open innovation has become a fundamental business phenomenon or remains a passing fad in corporate strategy.
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Absorptive Capacity in the Software Industry: Identifying Dimensions That Affect Knowledge and Knowledge Creation Activities
Absorptive capacity—a firm's ability to use external knowledge effectively—comprises three dimensions: relationships with the external environment, internal structure and knowledge base of value creation groups, and individual absorptive abilities. The authors demonstrate that each dimension independently contributes to increased knowledge and knowledge creation activities in software firms.
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Artificial intelligence in health care: laying the Foundation for Responsible, sustainable, and inclusive innovation in low- and middle-income countries
AI technology offers potential to reduce health inequalities in low- and middle-income countries, but most applications are developed in wealthy nations without local evaluation. The authors propose five building blocks to guide responsible, sustainable, and inclusive AI healthcare development and implementation in resource-limited settings, addressing both benefits and risks.
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COMPLEX ADAPTIVE SYSTEMS AND THE DIFFUSION OF INNOVATIONS
This paper combines diffusion of innovations theory with complex adaptive systems theory to create a hybrid model for predicting and guiding behavior change in populations. Using the STOP AIDS campaign in San Francisco as an example, the authors show how heterogeneous social networks and weak ties between diverse groups can catalyze innovation adoption. The integrated framework offers practical tools for public sector innovators seeking to understand and influence how innovations spread through social systems.
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Open Collaboration for Innovation: Principles and Performance
Open collaboration—where participants create goods, reuse each other's work, coordinate loosely, and allow anyone to contribute—drives innovation across software, medicine, science, and everyday ventures. Using computational modeling, the authors show that open collaboration performs well even under difficult conditions: when cooperators are outnumbered, free riders exist, diversity is low, or resources are scarce. The model reveals that cooperativeness, participant diversity, and resource rivalry shape performance. Open collaboration represents a viable organizational form likely to expand beyond its current domains.
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Frugal Innovation: Core Competencies to Address Global Sustainability
Frugal innovation represents a core competency for addressing global sustainability challenges. The paper examines how resource-constrained approaches to innovation can deliver effective solutions to pressing environmental and social problems worldwide, positioning frugal methods as essential capabilities for organizations committed to sustainable development.
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Who captures value in a global innovation network?
This paper examines how value is distributed across the global supply chain for Apple's iPod. The authors analyze which companies—designers, manufacturers, and retailers—capture profits from the product's innovation and sales. Their findings reveal that Apple captures the largest share of value despite outsourcing most production, while component suppliers and manufacturers earn significantly less, demonstrating how innovation networks concentrate economic returns.
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The Diffusion of Innovations
This paper examines why Natural Environments (NE) approaches in early intervention (EI) services have spread slowly despite being mandated in law since 1991. The authors identify barriers including lack of public awareness, clinical and vendor system incentives against adoption, and insufficient family knowledge. They argue that successful diffusion requires engaging families as key stakeholders through clear communication about NE programs and valuing family involvement in intervention.
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Universities and innovation ecosystems: a dynamic capabilities perspective
Universities drive innovation ecosystems by developing talent, advancing technology, and partnering with industry and government. The paper applies dynamic capabilities theory to explain how universities can flexibly manage these ecosystem roles. Three case studies show universities successfully launching new industries, fostering entrepreneurship, and revitalizing local economies through strategic partner engagement.
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The Effects of Mainstream and Emerging Customer Orientations on Radical and Disruptive Innovations
Customer orientation affects innovation differently depending on the type. Mainstream customer focus drives radical innovations using new technology but hinders disruptive innovations targeting emerging markets. Emerging customer orientation boosts disruptive innovation but doesn't affect radical innovation. Technology scanning supports radical innovation, while willingness to cannibalize supports disruptive innovation. Firms can pursue both mainstream and emerging customer orientations simultaneously.
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Will It Spread or Not? The Effects of Social Influences and Network Topology on Innovation Diffusion
This paper uses agent-based modeling to test how social influence and network structure affect whether new products succeed or fail. The research finds that markets with strong social influence create uncertainty and make it harder for innovations to reach critical mass. Highly connected people (VIPs) matter mainly for spreading information widely, not for persuasive power. Network constraints on hub connections significantly hamper diffusion.
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Absorptive Capacity in High-Technology Markets: The Competitive Advantage of the Haves
Firms in high-technology markets must constantly renew their technological knowledge to stay competitive. This paper identifies absorptive capacity—the ability to acquire and use external technological know-how—as a critical dynamic capability. The authors find that marketing, R&D, and operations capabilities significantly strengthen absorptive capacity, which in turn boosts profitability. The faster the pace of technological change, the greater the profit advantage from strong absorptive capacity.
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Teacher motivation to implement an educational innovation: factors differentiating users and non-users of cooperative learning
This study identifies why teachers adopt or reject cooperative learning in classrooms. Using expectancy theory, researchers surveyed 933 teachers and found that teachers' belief in their ability to successfully implement the innovation matters most. The study shows that professional development programs should focus on building teacher confidence and providing ongoing support tailored to individual classroom contexts.
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The Open Innovation in Science research field: a collaborative conceptualisation approach
This paper develops a unified framework for understanding open and collaborative practices in scientific research. Forty-seven scholars from multiple disciplines collaborated to integrate fragmented knowledge about open innovation and open science, identifying factors at individual, team, organizational, field, and societal levels that shape these practices. The framework connects research antecedents, contingencies, and consequences across the entire process of generating, disseminating, and translating scientific insights into innovation.
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Core Knowledge Employee Creativity and Firm Performance: The Moderating Role of Riskiness Orientation, Firm Size, and Realized Absorptive Capacity
This study examines how employee creativity affects firm performance in high-technology companies, finding that the relationship depends on three factors: firms with high risk tolerance see creativity hurt performance, while firms with strong absorptive capacity see it improve performance, and small firms benefit more from creativity than large firms do.
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Complex Thinking in the Framework of Education 4.0 and Open Innovation—A Systematic Literature Review
This systematic review of 35 studies examines how complex thinking—including critical, systemic, scientific, and innovative thinking—develops in Education 4.0 environments. The research finds that critical thinking receives the most attention, qualitative methods dominate studies, and teaching methods are the primary Education 4.0 component. Key challenges include project feasibility, research gaps, and skill development needed for reasoning in complex systems.
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Making the Most of Where You Are: Geography, Networks, and Innovation in Organizations
Geographic proximity to industry peers boosts innovation performance, but this effect depends on a firm's internal network structure. Companies far from competitors benefit from inefficient, diverse internal networks that generate knowledge internally. Companies near competitors perform better with cohesive networks that efficiently process information. The study analyzed nanotechnology firms in the US from 1990 to 2004.
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Open innovation in the automotive industry
Automotive manufacturers traditionally relied on internal R&D to drive innovation, but rising costs and competitive pressure force them to seek external sources. This study demonstrates that open innovation—collaborating with external partners—delivers better R&D productivity than closed, internally-focused approaches for automotive companies.
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Flexibility-Oriented HRM Systems, Absorptive Capacity, and Market Responsiveness and Firm Innovativeness
Flexibility-oriented human resource management systems boost firm innovation and market responsiveness by enhancing absorptive capacity. The study examined high-technology firms and found that HRM systems designed for resource and coordination flexibility increase both the firm's potential to learn and its ability to apply that learning. This improved learning capacity directly strengthens market responsiveness and innovation performance.
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Getting Customers' Ideas to Work for You: Learning from Dell how to Succeed with Online User Innovation Communities
Dell's IdeaStorm online community demonstrates how firms can harness user innovation through Web 2.0 platforms. The study identifies four critical challenges: understanding submitted ideas, selecting the best ones, balancing community transparency with competitive secrecy, and maintaining long-term engagement. Analysis of IdeaStorm's first 18 months yields seven practical recommendations for companies seeking to integrate user-generated innovation into their product development processes.
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Health Innovation Networks to Help Developing Countries Address Neglected Diseases
Developing countries increasingly possess the capacity to undertake health innovation and address neglected diseases affecting their populations. While wealthy nations have created funding mechanisms and organizational structures to develop and distribute health products, these efforts alone cannot achieve sustainability or adequately address disease burden. The paper argues that enabling health innovation networks within developing countries themselves offers a complementary and essential strategy to improve health equity and tackle neglected tropical diseases.
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User Roles and Contributions in Innovation-Contest Communities
This study identifies six distinct user types in online innovation-contest communities by analyzing behavioral patterns, communication styles, and contribution quality. The researchers found that participants vary significantly in how they engage with contests and interact with others. Understanding these user roles helps organizations design better contest platforms and reward structures to encourage participation and improve innovation outcomes.
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Managing the Challenges of Becoming an Open Innovation Company: Experiences from Living Labs
Companies increasingly integrate users directly into innovation processes through living labs, recognizing that user feedback and experiences drive valuable ideas and competitive advantage. This paper examines how organizations manage the transition to open innovation models where users actively participate in developing and testing new technologies across industries.
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The Evolution of Technologies in Time and Space: From National and Regional to Spatial Innovation Systems
This paper proposes spatial innovation systems (SISs) as a framework that extends beyond national and regional innovation systems. SISs track how specific technologies evolve across locations over time, showing how technological development depends on path-dependent histories and how specialized regions collaborate across national borders. The approach emphasizes external relationships between actors as crucial connectors that link different innovation systems together.
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Connecting the Parts with the Whole: Toward an Information Ecology Theory of Digital Innovation Ecosystems
Digital innovation ecosystems bring together diverse autonomous actors across organizational boundaries to create innovations of significant social and economic value. This paper develops an information ecology theory explaining how digital technologies integrate the efforts of independent parties into coherent wholes. The theory identifies key functions digital technologies serve in providing information to support interactions and tasks across ecosystems of varying scales, offering insights into managing part-whole relations and multilevel interactions.
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Co-creation and open innovation: Systematic literature review
This systematic literature review of 168 open-access articles from 2014–2017 examines the relationship between open science, co-creation of knowledge, and open innovation. The research identifies that the United States and Brazil lead in publishing on this topic, primarily in business and academic sectors. The study concludes that collaborative practices and context are essential for driving innovation and open science, while highlighting challenges around opening research and innovation processes.
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Network-Independent Partner Selection and the Evolution of Innovation Networks
This paper argues that firms select innovation partners based on complementary knowledge stocks rather than social capital or network position. The authors build a model where companies form alliances to learn and innovate, requiring compatible knowledge bases. Despite ignoring social network effects entirely, the model reproduces the firm behavior, network structures, and performance patterns documented in empirical alliance research.
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Looking through a responsible innovation lens at uneven engagements with digital farming
Digital farming platforms in North America are built on narrow values that favor large-scale commodity crop farmers over organic and smaller operations. Designers and engineers select agricultural data that prioritizes agronomic metrics while excluding data relevant to diverse farming practices. The paper argues that responsible innovation in agricultural technology requires engaging a wider range of food system actors and incorporating diverse values into data infrastructure decisions from the outset.
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Learning how to restructure: absorptive capacity and improvisational views of restructuring actions and performance
This paper examines how organizational learning shapes corporate restructuring decisions and outcomes. Companies with repeated experience in sell-offs adopt similar strategies and achieve better financial results, reflecting absorptive capacity. Conversely, recent spin-off experience drives subsequent spin-offs and performance gains, reflecting organizational improvisation. The study shows that different types of restructuring experience produce different strategic choices and financial outcomes.
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The User Innovation Paradigm: Impacts on Markets and Welfare
Individual users and consumers drive significant innovation alongside traditional producer-led research. This paper models markets where both users and firms innovate, showing that firms often delay adopting user-innovation strategies too long despite social welfare gains. When firms support and harvest user innovations, markets achieve better outcomes through complementary investments. Policy intervention may be needed to align private incentives with social welfare in mixed user-producer innovation economies.
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Responsible Urban Innovation with Local Government Artificial Intelligence (AI): A Conceptual Framework and Research Agenda
This paper examines how local governments can responsibly adopt artificial intelligence systems to address urban challenges. The authors develop a conceptual framework for responsible urban innovation with AI, arguing that technology deployment must balance costs, benefits, risks, and impacts to avoid creating new problems. They review existing literature and applications, then propose a research agenda to help policymakers understand how to implement local government AI systems responsibly.
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Storm Clouds and Silver Linings: Responding to Disruptive Innovations Through Cognitive Resilience
Small incumbent firms respond differently to disruptive business model innovations depending on how managers cognitively frame the threat and opportunity. The study finds that managers' prior risk experience shapes how they perceive opportunities, while perceived urgency influences how they assess threats. Analysis of 126 real estate brokers facing discount broker competition confirms this framework, showing that cognitive resilience—balancing threat and opportunity perception—determines whether small firms adopt, resist, or adapt to disruption.
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Information technology innovations: general diffusion patterns and its relationships to innovation characteristics
This study examines how characteristics of information technology innovations predict their adoption patterns across large American firms. Analyzing 20 IT innovations in 313 companies, the researchers found that internal influence (imitation among firms) dominates diffusion, while external influence (marketing) remains minimal. Five distinct technology clusters emerged based on adoption speed and saturation levels, suggesting that innovation characteristics can help predict how quickly IT solutions spread through organizations.
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3D printed Mg-NiTi interpenetrating-phase composites with high strength, damping capacity, and energy absorption efficiency
Researchers developed a magnesium-nickel-titanium composite using 3D printing and melt infiltration that overcomes the typical trade-off between strength and damping in metals. The material combines high strength across temperature ranges, excellent damage tolerance, strong damping capacity, and efficient energy absorption. Heat treatment can recover both shape and strength after deformation, opening new possibilities for structural and biomedical applications.
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Innovation network
Technological progress builds cumulatively as innovations in one field enable advances in related fields. Using 1.8 million US patents and citation patterns from 1975–1994, the authors map how innovation networks function. They show that the strength of existing connections between technology fields predicts future innovation after 1995. Technology classes with more upstream innovations to build upon subsequently innovate more.
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Adoption of<i>Moringa oleifera</i>to Combat Under-Nutrition Viewed Through the Lens of the “Diffusion of Innovations” Theory
Moringa oleifera, a nutrient-rich tree grown in tropical regions, is rapidly spreading as a treatment for under-nutrition despite lacking rigorous clinical evidence. The paper applies diffusion of innovations theory to explain why adoption continues to grow among healthcare practitioners and community leaders. The analysis reveals the need for scientific validation of moringa's nutritional benefits to support informed decision-making.
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Disrupting College: How Disruptive Innovation Can Deliver Quality and Affordability to Postsecondary Education.
Online learning is disrupting higher education by enabling affordable, quality postsecondary options. The authors document rapid growth in online course enrollment from 10 percent of students in 2003 to nearly 30 percent by 2009, projecting 50 percent by 2014. This technology shift explains the rise of for-profit institutions while traditional colleges struggle financially.
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Disruptive innovations for designing and diffusing evidence-based interventions.
Evidence-based interventions remain underadopted in the United States despite rapid growth. The authors argue that applying disruptive innovation principles—simplifying interventions, reducing costs, and improving accessibility—can accelerate EBI diffusion. They propose four research approaches: synthesizing common elements across interventions, experimenting with new delivery formats including technology and paraprofessionals, adopting market strategies for promotion, and implementing continuous quality improvement based on monitoring data.
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Regional Innovation Systems in Canada: A Comparative Study
This study examines how small and medium enterprises in two Canadian regions—Ottawa and Beauce—engage in innovation activities and interact with other organizations. Despite their different industrial structures and institutional environments, firms in both regions show similar innovation patterns and draw on regional, national, and global knowledge sources. Geography matters less than expected; firms do not rely primarily on regional support for innovation.
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Chez Panisse: Building an Open Innovation Ecosystem
Chez Panisse built a thriving business by adopting open innovation practices that connected suppliers, alumni chefs, staff, and food writers into a collaborative ecosystem. The restaurant's success came from sharing knowledge, fostering individual growth, and establishing trust among participants. This case demonstrates how a small firm can scale through strategic ecosystem building rather than isolated operations.
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Nonstate Actors and the Diffusion of Innovations: The Case of Suicide Terrorism
This paper examines how terrorist groups adopt suicide tactics as an innovation, showing that organizational capabilities and external linkages between groups significantly influence adoption patterns. The study finds that occupation, previously considered a key predictor, does not reliably explain which groups adopt suicide terrorism. By treating suicide tactics as a military innovation diffusion problem, the paper connects terrorism studies to broader innovation theory.
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How open innovation can help you cope in lean times
During economic downturns, companies can maintain innovation despite cutting R&D budgets by adopting open innovation strategies. The authors identify five strategic moves that externalize certain assets and projects, allowing outside firms to invest in and develop them or enabling spin-offs that retain partial equity. This inside-out approach preserves growth opportunities while reducing costs, though it requires holistic implementation and senior executive leadership to overcome organizational and cultural barriers.
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Entrepreneurial orientation‐as‐experimentation and firm performance: The enabling role of absorptive capacity
Entrepreneurial orientation increases variability in innovation outcomes, which can either boost or harm firm performance. The paper shows that absorptive capacity—a firm's ability to acquire and use new knowledge—plays a critical role. Potential absorptive capacity amplifies the innovation variability from entrepreneurial orientation, while realized absorptive capacity helps firms convert that variability into actual performance gains.
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Grand Societal Challenges and Responsible Innovation
Grand societal challenges require innovation from businesses, governments, and nonprofits working together. The paper argues that responsible innovation—a framework evaluating innovations for harmful consequences and societal benefits—offers a better approach than traditional corporate social responsibility. The authors call for research linking responsible innovation governance to addressing complex, multi-level societal problems.
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Consensus + innovations distributed inference over networks: cooperation and sensing in networked systems
This paper presents distributed inference algorithms that combine consensus mechanisms with real-time sensing innovations across networked agents without central coordination. Agents communicate locally over sparse networks while simultaneously sensing new observations, rather than iterating to consensus between measurements. The authors develop asymptotically optimal approaches that match centralized inference performance by balancing collaboration potential against local innovation potential through mixed-scale stochastic approximation.
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Perspectives on Disruptive Innovations
This paper examines disruptive innovation from multiple theoretical perspectives—evolutionary, relational, temporal, and framing—to understand how innovations render existing business models obsolete and reshape value networks. Rather than predicting disruption, the authors propose a performative approach that helps researchers and practitioners manage in environments of continual change.
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Technological Capabilities, Open Innovation, and Eco-Innovation: Dynamic Capabilities to Increase Corporate Performance of SMEs
Small and medium enterprises in Mexico improve corporate performance through technological capabilities that enable open innovation and eco-innovation practices. The study of 684 SMEs shows technological capability does not directly boost performance, but works through open innovation or eco-innovation. Both open and eco-innovation independently strengthen corporate performance, demonstrating that encouraging these practices in SMEs yields measurable business benefits.
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Open innovation in the public sector: drivers and barriers for the adoption of Challenge.gov
Federal agencies use Challenge.gov to crowdsource citizen ideas for solving public sector problems. Analysis of contest data and interviews with thirty-six managers across fourteen departments reveals that organizational barriers limit adoption of this open innovation approach. However, when innovation mandates align with an agency's core mission, organizations successfully change their procedures and how they acquire innovations.
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The diffusion of environmental sustainability innovations in North American hotels and ski resorts
This study surveyed North American hotels and ski resorts to identify which environmental sustainability innovations they adopt and what drives adoption rates. Using diffusion of innovations theory, researchers found that perceived simplicity of innovations and strong opinion leadership among resort managers most strongly predicted adoption. Relative advantage and general innovativeness also mattered. The research recommends that sustainability advocates emphasize ease of implementation to accelerate adoption across the hospitality sector.
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Stakeholder Governance for Responsible Innovation: A Theory of Value Creation, Appropriation, and Distribution
Organizations pursuing responsible innovation to address societal challenges lack clear governance mechanisms for distributing created value among stakeholders. This paper proposes a three-stage model of value allocation based on stakeholder governance: deciding what value to create and for whom, protecting against unintended value appropriation, and distributing value among intended stakeholders. Four novel governance mechanisms enable participative processes that align value distribution with responsible innovation intent.
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A Strategy for the Analysis of Idea Innovation Networks and Institutions
This paper argues that radical innovations in science-based industries emerge from idea innovation networks spanning six research arenas: basic research, applied research, product development, production, quality control, and commercialization. The authors find that innovation success depends on diversity of knowledge and frequent communication within arenas, plus intense cross-arena communication to transfer tacit knowledge. Institutional environments shape arena size and connectivity, with patterns suggesting either national innovation systems or globalization effects.
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Actualizing Innovation Effort: The Impact of Market Knowledge Diffusion in a Dynamic System of Competition
Market knowledge diffusion drives innovation effort through three mechanisms: knowledge level, knowledge change, and shared understanding of customers and competitors. However, satisfaction with past performance reduces innovation effort. The study finds that innovation effort alone doesn't improve firm performance; instead, shared market knowledge enables smaller firms to convert innovation into better returns than larger competitors can achieve.
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Physics faculty and educational researchers: Divergent expectations as barriers to the diffusion of innovations
Physics education researchers and faculty have divergent expectations that hinder innovation adoption. While faculty do implement some research-based changes, they underutilize educational research and report dissatisfaction with researcher interactions. Researchers typically disseminate finished curricula expecting adoption as-is, but faculty want researchers to collaborate with them to adapt innovations to their specific teaching contexts. This mismatch between dissemination models and faculty needs limits the impact of physics education research on actual teaching practices.
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Information Technology Use as a Learning Mechanism: The Impact of IT Use on Knowledge Transfer Effectiveness, Absorptive Capacity, and Franchisee Performance1
This study examines how franchisees use information technology to learn and improve performance. The researchers found that IT use enhances knowledge transfer from franchisors and builds franchisees' capacity to absorb and apply that knowledge. This improved learning capacity then drives better financial performance. The findings were tested across 783 real-estate franchisees and held consistent across different analytical approaches.
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Of Mice and Academics: Examining the Effect of Openness on Innovation
Reduced access costs to research materials boost innovation by encouraging new researchers to enter fields and explore diverse research directions. Using NIH agreements that lowered costs for accessing genetically engineered mice in the late 1990s, the authors find that openness increased both researcher entry and research diversity without reducing the creation of new research tools. Strong intellectual property restrictions impose hidden costs by limiting exploration and reducing research output diversity.
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Introducing responsible innovation in health: a policy-oriented framework
This paper develops a framework for responsible innovation in health that aligns new health technologies with societal values through early stakeholder engagement. The framework identifies nine dimensions organized across five value domains: population health, health system, economic, organizational, and environmental. The authors provide policymakers with a tool to assess whether health innovations address system-level challenges like sustainability and equity.
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Blueprint for introducing innovation into wireless mobile networks
The paper examines how wireless mobile networks are shifting from closed, proprietary systems toward more open ecosystems. This transformation enables handsets to function as mobile computers running user-developed applications on open operating systems. The shift increases competition and innovation, ultimately benefiting users through greater choice and access to new ideas.
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Innovation processes in online newsrooms as actor-networks and communities of practice
This paper examines how innovation happens in online newsrooms using two theoretical frameworks: actor-network theory and community of practice. Through four newsroom case studies, the authors show how these theories explain which actors influence innovation decisions, how journalists negotiate and learn together, and what factors help or hinder the adoption of new practices in newsrooms.
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Responsible Development and Application of Surgical Innovations: A Position Statement of the Society of University Surgeons
This position statement from the Society of University Surgeons addresses the responsible development and application of surgical innovations. The authors establish principles and guidelines for how surgical innovations should be developed, tested, and implemented in clinical practice to ensure patient safety and ethical standards while advancing surgical care.
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Global Diffusion of Technological Innovations: A Coupled-Hazard Approach
This paper develops a coupled-hazard methodology to analyze how technological innovations spread globally across countries. The approach distinguishes between when a country first introduces a technology and when it achieves full adoption. Applied to digital telecommunications switches across 160+ countries, the method captures discontinuous diffusion patterns and reveals the separate dynamics of implementation and confirmation stages in technology adoption.
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Open innovation, information, and entrepreneurship within platform ecosystems
Companies use platform ecosystems as open innovation strategies to encourage developers to create complementary products. This study examines what information within these ecosystems drives entrepreneurs to commercialize free products. The research finds that product-specific information correlates with commercialization decisions, while market information does not. Platform designers can strategically manage information to encourage commercial activity among complementors.
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Anticipating Disruptive Innovation
Organizations must balance efficient current operations with future innovation, managing both disruptive and sustaining innovations simultaneously. The paper identifies three distinct patterns of substitution that show how customer needs and technological capabilities interact to drive innovation. Understanding these dynamics helps companies anticipate and navigate disruptive change.
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Propagation of innovations in networked groups.
This paper examines how network structure affects groups' ability to discover and share solutions. Researchers created laboratory groups where participants made guesses and shared scores with network neighbors. Results show groups converge on similar solutions even when alternatives exist. The optimal network structure depends on the problem: clustered networks excel at broad exploration, while highly connected networks work better for focused problems.
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The Effects of Market Network Heterogeneity on Innovation Diffusion: An Agent‐Based Modeling Approach
This paper uses agent-based modeling to examine how network structure affects innovation diffusion. The researchers find that how consumers connect to each other and communicate within market segments significantly influences how quickly innovations spread. Identifying key communicator nodes in networks allows organizations to better target their innovation strategies to different market segments and accelerate adoption.
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Is regional innovation system development possible in peripheral regions? Some evidence from the case of La Pocatière, Canada
This paper examines whether peripheral regions can develop functional innovation systems by studying La Pocatière, Canada. The authors identify the key actors and structural elements of the region's innovation system, then analyze the factors and dynamics that drive innovation activity and enable the system to transform and grow. They draw on historical documents, statistical data, and interviews with leaders from private and public organizations.
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Diffusion of innovations
This fourth edition of a foundational health behavior textbook provides comprehensive analysis of health behavior theories relevant to health education and practice. The work synthesizes theory, research, and practical applications to guide health professionals in understanding and influencing health behaviors across populations.
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Triple helix circulation: the heart of innovation and development
The triple helix model—involving universities, industry, and government—drives innovation and development through the movement of people and knowledge across these sectors. Universities now function as key socio-economic actors beyond their traditional role as knowledge providers. The paper argues that removing barriers to circulation and strengthening cooperation among these development actors is essential for achieving sustainable, knowledge-based development in resource-constrained societies.
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Value Cocreation and Wealth Spillover in Open Innovation Alliances1
Open innovation alliances where competitors collaborate on technology development create significant economic value. Firms entering these alliances experience positive stock returns, with even greater gains when market leaders join late. Surprisingly, rival firms outside the alliance also benefit financially, with non-participating incumbents gaining the most. Innovation type and alliance openness affect returns, while partner diversity does not.
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Grassroots Innovation for Urban Sustainability: Comparing the Diffusion Pathways of Three Ecovillage Projects
Three ecovillage projects successfully spread sustainable practices through education and outreach activities. One project achieved broader impact by partnering with municipal planners to create a new zoning category, enabling mainstream developers to adopt ecovillage concepts. The research shows that grassroots innovation projects bridge niche and mainstream sectors most effectively when they operate simultaneously in two distinct action domains.
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Being a Catalyst of Innovation: The Role of Knowledge Diversity and Network Closure
This study identifies innovation catalysts—people who support and promote colleagues' innovativeness—within organizational research teams. The researchers found that individuals with access to diverse knowledge through closed networks become effective catalysts. Analyzing 276 R&D researchers at a multinational tech company, they show catalysts significantly boost their colleagues' patent applications, revealing an important but overlooked role in the innovation process beyond inventors themselves.
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Network Dynamics of Innovation Processes
This paper presents a mathematical model explaining how innovations emerge through random walks on networks of interconnected ideas. The model shows that innovations occur when cognitive processes first reach new concepts, with network connections strengthening through repeated use. The framework successfully predicts both the rate at which new discoveries appear and how they correlate with each other across scientific disciplines.
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Absorptive Capacity in Buyer–supplier Relationships: Empirical Evidence of Its Mediating Role
Absorptive capacity—the ability to identify, assimilate, and exploit external knowledge—mediates the relationship between organizational compatibility and performance outcomes in buyer-supplier relationships. Analysis of 153 and 199 companies supplying major retailers and distributors shows that compatibility alone does not ensure innovation and efficiency gains. Absorptive capacity drives these improvements, particularly for innovation under high demand uncertainty. Managers must prioritize partners' learning capabilities, not just compatibility.
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Connecting local entrepreneurial ecosystems to global innovation networks: open innovation, double networks and knowledge integration
Large and small firms increasingly tap dispersed knowledge from universities, research institutes, and SMEs through open innovation and global networks. This paper argues that regional innovative ecosystems play a crucial role in attracting R&D activity and enabling knowledge integration. Success requires firms to simultaneously integrate knowledge locally and globally, internally and externally, within double network structures that connect entrepreneurial ecosystems to worldwide innovation networks.
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R&D/Returns Causality: Absorptive Capacity or Organizational IQ
This paper challenges the absorptive capacity theory by arguing that firms' ability to benefit from R&D spending reflects innate organizational capability rather than investment behavior. The author finds that when accounting for differences in firm quality, the interaction between a firm's own R&D and rivals' R&D becomes insignificant. Higher-performing firms invest more in R&D, but R&D spending itself does not improve a firm's capacity to learn from competitors' innovations.
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Universal Chiplet Interconnect Express (UCIe): An Open Industry Standard for Innovations With Chiplets at Package Level
UCIe is an open industry standard that enables chiplets from different suppliers to work together in any package configuration. The paper describes the architectural, circuit, channel, and packaging design choices that went into the UCIe 1.0 specification and presents implementation results from their channel and circuit studies.
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Diffusion of Innovations and Network Segmentation: The Part Played by People in Promoting Health
This paper demonstrates how diffusion of innovations theory integrates mass media, interpersonal communication, and social network analysis to improve health promotion. The authors review studies on STD/HIV prevention and find that interventions using interpersonal communication successfully increase safer sex behaviors. They conclude that social network analysis enables more effective and tailored health promotion program design.
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The Local Innovation System as a Source of 'Variety': Openness and Adaptability in New York City's Garment District
New York City's Garment District sustains innovation in women's wear by drawing on design ideas from emerging clusters like the Lower East Side. The District's institutional infrastructure enables designers to access and exploit this variety of innovations. This diversity, combined with economic coherence, allows the District to adapt successfully to changing competitive pressures.
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Tackling Societal Challenges with Open Innovation
Open innovation—combining external knowledge and market pathways with internal processes—has traditionally served business goals. This paper argues that open innovation can address societal challenges, though doing so creates trade-offs and tensions. The authors introduce articles from the World Open Innovation Conference examining how organizations deploy open innovation to tackle broader social problems beyond profit.
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Ego-Network Stability and Innovation in Alliances
This study examines how stable alliance networks affect firm innovation in biopharmaceutical companies. The researchers find that stable ego-networks actually reduce innovation outcomes. However, firms can mitigate this negative effect by spanning structural holes across their alliance partners. Geographic concentration of inventive activities in a single country worsens the innovation penalty from network stability.
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In Search of Precision in Absorptive Capacity Research: A Synthesis of the Literature and Consolidation of Findings
This paper clarifies what absorptive capacity means and how it affects firm performance. The authors identify three core dimensions: absorptive effort (knowledge investments), absorptive knowledge base (existing knowledge stock), and absorptive process (internal knowledge practices). Meta-analysis shows absorptive capacity significantly improves firm outcomes, with knowledge acquisition and innovation generation as key mechanisms. Effects vary depending on external knowledge conditions.
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An innovation diffusion model of TQM implementation
This paper models Total Quality Management (TQM) as an organizational innovation that spreads through four stages: adoption by top management, adaptation of employee capabilities and attitudes, acceptance demonstrated through teamwork and supplier relationships, and routinization of quality practices. Testing the framework on 407 automobile parts supplier plants, the authors found that successful TQM implementation requires preparing employees and suppliers technically and behaviorally, and integrating all sociotechnical elements throughout the organization.
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Power in Firm Networks: What it Means for Regional Innovation Systems
Transnational corporations dominate regional firm networks and use their power to monopolize critical innovation resources like university research and skilled labor, undermining small and medium-sized firms' capacity to innovate. The paper argues that network functioning is inherently conflictual, with powerful firms advancing their competitive advantage while creating uneven resource distribution across regions, with significant consequences for regional policy.
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Innovation, diffusion and adoption of total quality management (TQM)
This paper examines whether Total Quality Management (TQM) remains a viable management philosophy or has become a passing fad. Through literature review, the authors trace TQM's innovation, diffusion, and adoption across organizations globally. They find that despite declining media coverage, TQM continues gaining academic attention and organizational adoption worldwide. The authors argue TQM remains relevant but warn against treating it as a generic technique—organizations must adapt it to their specific cultural contexts, leadership styles, and employee needs to prevent it from becoming a fad.
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Perspectives on Supply Network–Enabled Innovations
Organizations increasingly rely on their supply networks to drive innovation success. This paper presents two frameworks showing how firms can integrate their internal knowledge with supply network expertise to improve innovation performance. The frameworks draw on absorptive capacity and ambidexterity theories to explain how companies align internal research efforts with external supply network knowledge.
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How Does Innovation Emerge in a Service Ecosystem?
This study examines how innovation emerges within service ecosystems using four years of case study data on an Internet-of-Things technology solution. The research identifies institutional reconciliation as a previously overlooked phase in innovation development, showing that ideas are refined through four types of institutional pressures and shaped by plasticity in four distinct ways. The findings establish innovation as a systemic process and recommend that managers cultivate organizational norms, rules, and beliefs to support innovation emergence.
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BENEFITING FROM SUPPLIER OPERATIONAL INNOVATIVENESS: THE INFLUENCE OF SUPPLIER EVALUATIONS AND ABSORPTIVE CAPACITY
Manufacturers benefit from suppliers' operational innovations, but capturing this value requires two strategies: evaluating supplier performance and developing absorptive capacity to learn from suppliers. A survey of 136 manufacturers and 272 suppliers shows both approaches significantly enhance the benefits of supplier innovation, particularly when suppliers handle knowledge-intensive tasks. Supplier evaluation and learning capacity work together to unlock innovation value.
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Innovation Alignment and Project Network Dynamics: An Integrative Model for Change
This paper examines how project networks affect innovation adoption using data from 3D CAD technology diffusion across 82 firms in three countries. The authors develop a two-stage model showing that innovation success depends first on alignment with existing work allocation, then on network factors including relational stability, shared interests, boundary permeability, and change agents. The model resolves conflicting theories about whether networks promote or hinder innovation.
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Patient Perceptions of a Personal Health Record: A Test of the Diffusion of Innovation Model
This study applies diffusion of innovation theory to understand how patients perceive personal health records (PHRs). Surveying 760 patients, researchers found that PHR users valued ease of use and relative advantage more than non-users. Computer literacy and personal innovativeness in technology distinguished users from non-adopters. The diffusion of innovation model successfully predicted which factors drive PHR adoption and perceived value for doctor communication.
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Biotechnology Clusters as Regional, Sectoral Innovation Systems
Biotechnology firms cluster near universities and knowledge sources, forming regional innovation systems that depend on complex interactions between scientists, entrepreneurs, investors, and lawyers. The paper analyzes how these regional sectoral innovation systems function by examining cases in Germany, Cambridge Massachusetts, and Cambridge UK, showing that proximity to research institutions, clinical trial facilities, and specialized services enables the transfer of scientific knowledge into commercial biotechnology products.
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Is it too complex? The curious case of supply network complexity and focal firm innovation
Supply network complexity affects how well firms innovate. Using data from 201 firms across six industries, the authors find that horizontal and vertical complexity boost innovation but with diminishing returns, while spreading suppliers across many locations harms innovation. A firm's strategic focus and power over suppliers shapes these relationships. The findings guide managers on sourcing decisions.
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Whose Innovation Performance Benefits More from External Networks: Entrepreneurial or Conservative Firms?
External networks boost innovation performance more for conservative, risk-averse firms than for entrepreneurial ones. Using data from 1,978 U.S. firms, the research shows that firms with weak entrepreneurial orientation gain greater innovation benefits from learning through external networks than firms with strong entrepreneurial orientation. This effect is stronger in small and medium-sized enterprises than in large firms.
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The Disruption Machine: What the gospel of innovation gets wrong
Lepore critiques the widespread adoption of disruption theory in business and innovation discourse, arguing that the concept has become oversold and misapplied. She examines how disruption rhetoric dominates consulting, education, and venture capital, often promoting panic and exaggerated claims about technological and market change without grounding these ideas in rigorous evidence or historical context.
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Diffusion of innovations in social networks
This paper examines how innovations spread through social networks using the linear threshold model, where individuals adopt innovations only after exposure from multiple neighbors. The authors find that innovations spread further in networks with lower clustering, contradicting existing literature. They provide analytical evidence and simulations supporting this claim, and extend the model to account for path dependence, showing how small shocks can significantly alter diffusion outcomes.
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How Central Is Too Central? Organizing Interorganizational Collaboration Networks for Breakthrough Innovation
In the U.S. pharmaceutical industry between 1985 and 2001, firms achieved breakthrough innovation by collaborating with central alliance partners, but only up to a point. Beyond optimal centrality, innovation performance declined. Firms with more private partners relative to public partners experienced less performance loss from excessive central partner collaboration. The findings show that strategic partner selection in alliance networks directly shapes breakthrough innovation outcomes.
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Perceptions toward Artificial Intelligence among Academic Library Employees and Alignment with the Diffusion of Innovations’ Adopter Categories
This study surveyed academic librarians about their perceptions of artificial intelligence and how they adopt new technologies. Researchers matched librarians' adoption patterns to Rogers' Diffusion of Innovations model categories—innovators, early adopters, early majority, late majority, and laggards. The findings show how librarians' self-identified adoption categories relate to their knowledge and attitudes toward AI in library settings, offering insights for managing technology adoption among library staff.
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Tourists' perceptions of environmentally responsible innovations at tourism businesses
Tourists with strong nature-oriented motivations view environmentally responsible practices at tourism businesses as significantly more important and valuable than tourists without such motivations. A survey of visitors to Arizona tourism centers found that nature-oriented tourists consistently rated green innovations more favorably, suggesting that visitor attitudes toward environmental practices depend heavily on their underlying travel motivations and connection to nature.
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The generative and developmental roles of universities in regional innovation systems
Universities play multiple roles in developing regional innovation systems beyond technology transfer. This paper proposes an analytical framework to understand how universities contribute to regional innovation and why their roles vary across different regions. The framework moves beyond narrow institutional analysis to capture universities' broader developmental contributions to regional systems.
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Diffusion of Innovations and HIV/AIDS
This paper applies Diffusion of Innovations theory to HIV/AIDS prevention, analyzing why behavior change interventions succeed or fail across Western and developing countries. The author examines how communication channels, opinion leaders, and innovation attributes—relative advantage, compatibility, complexity, trialability, and observability—shape adoption of preventive measures. The paper identifies barriers limiting DOI's use in developing-world HIV prevention programs and argues the framework offers valuable insights for improving intervention design.
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Responsible Aquaculture in 2050: Valuing Local Conditions and Human Innovations Will Be Key to Success
Aquaculture must expand sustainably by 2050 by improving management practices, emphasizing local decision-making and human capacity development, implementing risk management to prevent disease and contamination, and creating market systems that identify and promote sustainable products. The paper argues that respecting local conditions and human innovation will be essential to avoid the intensification mistakes made in agriculture.
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Managing Open Innovation in Biotechnology
Innovation requires matching customer needs with enabling technologies. The paper defines innovation as commercializing technology that gives customers new capability, identifying two key requirements: understanding unmet customer needs and knowing available technologies. Roche Diagnostics demonstrates how companies can source external technologies by systematically evaluating them through these innovation drivers.
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Competing Through Innovation in Network Markets: Strategies for Challengers
Challenger firms can compete against dominant companies in network markets through strategic innovation. The paper develops a typology showing that radical and incompatible innovations often generate higher profits than incremental or compatible alternatives. Radical-incompatible innovation proves both more profitable and less risky than incremental-compatible approaches, suggesting that greater risk can be prudent depending on market conditions.
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The Diffusion of Innovation
This paper examines how innovations spread through populations by focusing on influentials—key individuals who drive adoption. Taylor argues that understanding and targeting these influential actors is critical to accelerating the diffusion of new ideas and practices across communities.
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Between local innovation and global impact: cities, networks, and the governance of climate change
Cities and city networks like the C40 Climate Leadership Group drive climate innovation outside formal international agreements, which have failed to reduce emissions. These non-state actors challenge traditional governance norms and generate coordinated responses through networks. The paper examines C40's history and network dynamics, then recommends Canada update federal climate policy to support city-network initiatives, fill policy gaps, and connect climate action to urban priorities.
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Introducing the dilemma of societal alignment for inclusive and responsible research and innovation
This paper identifies a critical governance challenge in research and innovation: the 'dilemma of societal alignment.' The authors argue that while inclusive and responsible innovation requires alignment between research goals and societal values, this alignment remains scattered and overlooked in science and technology policy. They build on Collingridge's technology control dilemma to propose a framework for addressing how governance can better integrate social considerations into innovation development and uptake.
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How information systems help create OM capabilities: Consequents and antecedents of operational absorptive capacity
Organizations use information systems to build knowledge management capabilities in operations departments. This study examines how technical IS design (integrated systems) and strategic alignment between business and IT enhance operational absorptive capacity—the ability to create and use operational knowledge. Analysis of 153 manufacturing firms shows that integrated IS capability strengthens both potential and realized absorptive capacity, with business-IT alignment amplifying these effects.
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Profiles of <sup>14</sup>C fixation through spinach leaves in relation to light absorption and photosynthetic capacity
This paper is not about rural innovation. It presents a laboratory study of photosynthetic processes in spinach leaves, measuring carbon dioxide fixation rates at different leaf depths under various light conditions. The researchers developed a model combining light absorption and photosynthetic capacity measurements to predict CO2 fixation profiles, finding strong agreement between observed and predicted results.
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The Innovation Delusion: How Our Obsession with the New Has Disrupted the Work That Matters Most
This paper critiques the widespread adoption of 'innovation-speak'—a Silicon Valley ideology that prioritizes disruptive change over maintenance and care. The authors argue that this rhetoric has infected cultural institutions like archives and libraries, creating a false hierarchy that devalues essential maintenance work. They demonstrate how this ideology damages organizations by neglecting the unglamorous but critical labor that keeps systems functioning, and call for institutions to adopt a 'maintenance mindset' instead.
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Diffusion of Innovations Under Supply Constraints
This paper develops a model for firms selling innovative products under production capacity constraints. The authors modify the Bass diffusion model to account for unmet demand affecting future sales. They show that immediately selling maximum output is suboptimal, and instead recommend a "build-up" strategy where firms delay sales to accumulate inventory, ensuring no lost sales once market entry begins. The analysis provides optimal timing and inventory levels for product rollout.
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Board Networks and Corporate Innovation
Well-connected corporate boards drive stronger innovation performance and output quality. The effect intensifies when firms need more external advice or face agency problems. Companies seeking external financing gain particular advantage from board connections to bankers. The researchers establish causality through director deaths, retirements, and regulatory changes affecting board composition, and show that connection types and director characteristics explain variation in outcomes.
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Technological innovation to achieve sustainable development—Renewable energy technologies diffusion in developing countries
Renewable energy technologies spread slowly in developing countries due to economic barriers and market failures. This paper examines diffusion obstacles through innovation systems theory, showing how socioeconomic factors affect renewable energy adoption. Governments can strengthen infant renewable markets by understanding these barriers and building robust innovation ecosystems that address poverty and inequality while creating competitive advantages.
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Rare Earths: Market Disruption, Innovation, and Global Supply Chains
A 2010-2011 rare earth price spike triggered innovation across geoscience, process engineering, and materials science. Researchers improved understanding of mineral deposits, made production and recycling more efficient, and developed substitutes requiring fewer rare earths. Though global supply chains remain largely unchanged, this innovation wave will reshape rare earth markets and supply chains in unpredictable ways.
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How open innovation affects the drivers of competitive advantage
Open innovation fundamentally reshapes how firms compete. While competitive advantage models remain valid, open innovation eliminates economic rents from property rights and reduces those from scale and capital requirements. However, rents from experience, differentiation, distribution, switching costs, networks, and reputation survive. Firms relying on innovation barriers, proprietary designs, or exclusive skills face long-term competitive losses under open innovation models.
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Information technology innovation diffusion: an information requirements paradigm
This paper explains why some manufacturing industries adopt internet-based innovations faster than others. The authors argue that information processing requirements—driven by process complexity, operational speed, and supply chain complexity—determine IT adoption rates. Analysis of US wood products and beverage manufacturing shows industries with higher information processing needs adopt IT innovations more extensively, with downstream supply chain structure playing a key role in adoption decisions.
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The spatiotemporal evolution of global innovation networks and the changing position of China: a social network analysis based on cooperative patents
Global innovation networks expanded significantly from 1999 to 2020, becoming more accessible and showing scale-free characteristics. Developed countries in Europe and the United States remain central nodes, though polarization weakened. Four distinct subgroups emerged. Economic and technological factors drive network formation more strongly than demographic factors. China's position strengthened substantially, increasingly serving as a transit hub connecting innovation partners.
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Administrative environmental innovations, supply network structure, and environmental disclosure
Administrative environmental innovations help firms track and manage environmental impacts, leading to greater environmental disclosure. The relationship strengthens when firms implement both internal and external innovations together. A firm's position within its supply network—measured by accessibility, control, and interconnectedness—moderates this relationship, affecting how network learning and status influence environmental reporting.
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Internet of Things for Green Building Management: Disruptive Innovations Through Low-Cost Sensor Technology and Artificial Intelligence
Buildings consume 60% of global electricity, but traditional management systems are expensive and impractical for small and medium-sized buildings. This paper demonstrates how Internet of Things sensors combined with artificial intelligence can monitor building energy use affordably. Low-cost IoT devices track occupancy and human activity patterns, enabling building managers to identify energy-saving opportunities and reduce consumption without expensive infrastructure.
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Social Capital and Learning Advantages: A Problem of Absorptive Capacity
Social capital and network relationships don't directly improve firm performance. Instead, absorptive capacity—a firm's ability to recognize, assimilate, and apply new knowledge—mediates and moderates how learning through networks translates into business results. The study challenges the assumption that new firms automatically gain performance advantages from their social connections.
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Bureaucratic Job Mobility and The Diffusion of Innovations
Bureaucratic job mobility drives policy innovation adoption across U.S. local governments. Agency leaders hired from outside organizations are significantly more likely to introduce professionally fashionable innovations than those promoted internally. The study of municipal police and water utility managers shows that government innovation depends on both demand for new policies and the supply of mobile administrators who bring professional priorities into their agencies.
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Network, knowledge and relationship impacts on innovation in tourism destinations
Tourism destinations innovate more when firms collaborate with trusted partners who share knowledge, and when they occupy central positions in local business networks. The study shows that relationship qualities like trust and shared knowledge drive innovation partnerships, while network position identifies the most successful innovators. Destination managers should encourage knowledge-sharing collaborations and position broker firms to bring in new ideas.
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Extending the technology acceptance model to mobile telecommunication innovation: The existence of network externalities
This study extends the Technology Acceptance Model to mobile telecommunications by examining how network externalities influence consumer adoption of Multimedia Messaging Services. The research confirms that perceived usefulness and ease of use drive acceptance, and adds that the number of existing users significantly affects adoption decisions. The findings show the Technology Acceptance Model effectively predicts consumer behavior for mobile innovations when network effects are present.
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Disruptive information system innovation: the case of internet computing
This paper develops a theory of disruptive information system innovation, defined as novel organizational applications of digital technologies that create radical breaks from expected trajectories. The authors argue that internet computing exemplifies disruptive IS innovation because it fundamentally transformed application portfolios, development practices, and IS services across organizations. They demonstrate that disruptive innovations are both pervasive—spanning all aspects of IS innovation—and radical, departing significantly from existing alternatives and requiring new cognitive models of computing.
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Measuring perceptions of innovation adoption: the diffusion of a federal drug prevention policy
Researchers developed and tested a 17-item scale measuring how school coordinators perceive a federal drug prevention policy across 12 states. The scale identified three key factors influencing adoption: relative advantage and compatibility with existing practices, complexity, and observability. Schools viewing the policy as advantageous and compatible were more likely to adopt it. The scale reliably measures these perceptions and can be adapted to assess adoption of other health education programs.
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“Open” disclosure of innovations, incentives and follow-on reuse: Theory on processes of cumulative innovation and a field experiment in computational biology
The paper examines how timing of knowledge disclosure—whether innovators share intermediate progress or only final results—affects subsequent innovation. Using theory and experiments in computational biology, the authors show that intermediate disclosure efficiently guides development toward existing solutions but reduces experimentation and technological diversity. Final disclosure encourages broader exploration. The findings reveal a fundamental tradeoff between steering innovation efficiently and enabling diverse technological search paths.
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The Role of Public and Private Protection in Disruptive Innovation: The Automotive Industry and the Emergence of Low‐Emission Vehicles
Car manufacturers pursuing low-emission vehicles face challenges making disruptive technology attractive to mainstream customers. This study examines how public protection levers—regulation, tax incentives, and public-private partnerships—and private levers—resource allocation, niche occupation, and collaboration—shape manufacturer strategies. Analysis of Daimler, General Motors, and Toyota across European, Japanese, and U.S. markets reveals two distinct trajectories: public protection initially drove commercialization but stalled due to systemic barriers, while private protection strategies subsequently gained momentum.
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Evolutionary Plasticity and Innovations in Complex Metabolic Reaction Networks
This paper studies how metabolic networks in bacteria evolve and adapt. The researchers found that these networks are robust to gene mutations and can rapidly acquire new metabolic abilities through gene loss and horizontal gene transfer. Networks with identical metabolic functions differ substantially in their reactions, yet can be connected through single mutations. This robustness enables evolutionary innovation by allowing organisms to explore new metabolic capabilities while maintaining survival.
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Topology and evolution of technology innovation networks
Patent citation networks from the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office reveal how technological innovations connect and evolve over time. The network exhibits scaling patterns consistent with preferential attachment and aging effects, similar to scientific citation networks. This suggests a universal mechanism governs how innovations build on prior ideas and designs.
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New developments in innovation and entrepreneurial ecosystems
This special section examines innovation and entrepreneurial ecosystems through multi-level analysis of agents, institutions, and regions. The authors synthesize research across the section, identifying key questions, theories, and methods used to study how ecosystems shape innovation and entrepreneurship. They propose a research agenda addressing context, process, and impact of these ecosystems.
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Creating shared value through open innovation approaches: Opportunities and challenges for corporate sustainability
Open innovation—where businesses collaborate with external partners—can advance corporate sustainability across economic, social, and environmental goals. External stakeholders help companies develop sustainable innovations, enter new markets, and create revenue streams while addressing social deficits. However, open innovation exposes organizations to risks including information leakage and difficulty controlling partner conduct, making trust and governance challenging.
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Social Business Model Innovation: A Quadruple/Quintuple Helix-Based Social Innovation Ecosystem
This paper proposes an ecosystem framework for social business model innovation using quadruple and quintuple helix models. The framework integrates civil society, political structures, environment, and sustainability to enable social innovation that improves human well-being. Case studies demonstrate that open innovation and clearly defined social missions drive successful social business models through collaborative knowledge creation and exploitation.
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Anticipatory life-cycle assessment for responsible research and innovation
Life-cycle assessment (LCA) can guide innovation toward beneficial outcomes, but current approaches rely on mature industries and lack stakeholder engagement. This paper proposes anticipatory LCA—a forward-looking method that explores uncertain future scenarios for emerging technologies without claiming prediction. By identifying key uncertainties and engaging decision-makers, anticipatory LCA can help researchers prioritize environmental considerations and promote responsible innovation.
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On the Decay Behavior of the CO<sub>2</sub>Absorption Capacity of CaO-Based Sorbents
This paper examines how calcium oxide-based sorbents lose their ability to capture CO2 over repeated absorption and desorption cycles. The authors propose a new mathematical equation that better describes this decay behavior using a single parameter. They identify sintering as the mechanism causing capacity loss and provide a method to compare different sorbents' performance using this decay parameter.
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Open Innovation and Firm Performance: The Mediating Role of Social Capital
Open innovation practices improve firm performance through two pathways: direct effects and indirect effects mediated by social capital. The study shows that when firms implement open innovation instruments, they build stronger social networks and relationships. These enhanced social connections then drive better firm performance. Social capital acts as a crucial mechanism linking innovation practices to business outcomes.
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Factors that influence the development and diffusion of technical innovations in the construction industry
The paper examines why some technical innovations spread quickly through construction while others languish. Researchers surveyed 233 innovations from construction industry sources and identified statistically significant factors that motivate initial investment, enable or block diffusion, and affect project outcomes. Successful innovations required an average of 38 months, 4,700 worker-hours, and $836,000 to develop, implement, and diffuse.
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Knowledge arbitrage in global pharma: a synthetic view of absorptive capacity and open innovation
This case study of a global pharmaceutical company reveals how open innovation operates in practice. The company focuses on building OI capabilities, sharing external information, and leveraging knowledge arbitrage across networks. Notably absent are value capture models and technology evaluation criteria common in OI literature. The researchers propose that absorptive capacity works bidirectionally with open innovation, enabling firms to both acquire and contribute knowledge effectively.
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Diffusion of innovations: Smartphones and wireless anatomy learning resources
Smartphones and media players enable new approaches to anatomy education. The author tested iPhones and iPod Touch devices with flashcards, PDFs, 3D imaging, podcasts, and clinical videos. These touch-screen devices offer practical wireless access to multimedia learning resources that students can use anywhere. As students widely adopt such personal technology, educators can develop portable, multiplatform educational content.
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Digital transformation of industrial firms: an innovation diffusion perspective
This paper applies innovation diffusion theory to explain digital transformation in large industrial firms. By studying General Electric and Siemens, the authors identify common drivers and inhibitors of successful digital transformation. The innovation diffusion framework effectively identifies factors that help or hinder firms' transformation processes, offering researchers and managers better tools to analyze and plan digital transformation strategies.
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Open innovation for sustainability through creating shared value-role of knowledge management system, openness and organizational structure
Open innovation for sustainability requires three critical conditions working together: knowledge management systems, organizational openness, and appropriate organizational structure. Manufacturing micro, small, and medium enterprises must configure these elements at different levels to create shared value with partners and stakeholders. Organizations succeed by expanding beyond internal resources to collaborate actively with manufacturers, retailers, and other stakeholders on sustainability problem-solving.
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Who Are Your Neighbors? The Role of Ideology and Decline of Geographic Proximity in the Diffusion of Policy Innovations
This study examines how U.S. states adopt policy innovations between 1960 and 2014, analyzing 556 policies to understand what drives adoption decisions. The research finds that ideological similarity between states remains a stable predictor of policy adoption, while geographic proximity to neighboring states has become less influential over time. Political polarization strengthens the role of ideology in shaping which states copy each other's policies.
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An Advantage of Newness: Vicarious Learning Despite Limited Absorptive Capacity
New firms entering markets typically lack the knowledge and capabilities of established competitors, but they can overcome this disadvantage through vicarious learning from incumbents. This study shows that new entrants actually learn more effectively from external knowledge during their own experiential learning processes than established firms do. Using data from U.S. commercial banking, the researchers find that entrants gain twice as much vicarious learning relative to their experiential learning compared to incumbents, suggesting newness creates a learning advantage rather than just a liability.
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Diffusion of Innovation Theory: A Bridge for the Research‐Practice Gap in Counseling
This paper applies diffusion of innovation theory to explain why counseling research findings fail to reach practitioners. The author outlines the research-practice gap in counseling and uses diffusion theory's core principles to propose research practices and questions that could help new evidence spread more effectively through the profession.
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The diffusion of human‐resource information‐technology innovations in US and non‐US firms
This study examines how eight human-resource information technologies spread across US, Canadian, UK, and Irish firms. The researchers found that internal influences—particularly contacts among potential adopters within their social networks—drove adoption decisions more than external factors. Results held consistent across different countries, user types, and technology types. The findings suggest firms need better-coordinated technology strategies to align purchasing with actual HR automation goals.
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Inter‐firm market orientation as antecedent of knowledge transfer, innovation and value creation in networks
Inter-firm market orientation—how companies in partnerships focus on understanding each other's markets—drives knowledge transfer, innovation, and value creation in strategic networks. The research shows that when firms adopt this collaborative market perspective, they improve performance through better knowledge sharing, increased innovation, and expanded market access.
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Modeling innovation, manufacturing, diffusion and adoption/rejection processes
The paper argues that new product development success depends on understanding complex feedback loops and interconnected processes rather than identifying individual success factors. Using system dynamics modeling and comparative case studies, the authors show that multiple different pathways lead to success or failure in innovation, manufacturing, diffusion, and adoption. Executives must think systemically about hidden weak linkages with large downstream impacts rather than relying on checklists of isolated factors.
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Networks of Innovation: Science, Technology and Development in the Triple Helix Era
Universities, industry, and government must collaborate through triple helix networks to drive knowledge-based development. Universities expand their missions beyond research to include economic and social development, shifting from individual to organizational focus. This networked approach fills technology and social capital gaps. Examples from the European Union, Canada, and Brazil demonstrate how triple helix models support firm formation and innovation incubation.
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Innovation Ecosystems vs. Innovation Systems in Terms of Collaboration and Co-creation of Value
This paper distinguishes innovation ecosystems from traditional innovation systems, emphasizing how collaborative networks create value together. The authors survey ecosystem research to identify key features and show how regional clusters, global value chains, and platforms operate as innovation ecosystems. They provide policy recommendations for governments seeking to foster innovation-conducive environments through ecosystem approaches.
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Low Buffer Capacity and Alternating Motility along the Human Gastrointestinal Tract: Implications for <i>in Vivo</i> Dissolution and Absorption of Ionizable Drugs
This paper is not about rural innovation. It is a pharmaceutical sciences study examining pH, buffer capacity, and motility in the human gastrointestinal tract to improve drug dissolution and absorption predictions. The authors measured these properties in healthy subjects after ibuprofen administration under fasted and fed conditions, finding extremely low buffer capacity throughout the upper GI tract with important implications for oral drug delivery formulation.
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Visualization of Communication Patterns in Collaborative Innovation Networks - Analysis of Some W3C Working Groups
This paper analyzes communication patterns in collaborative innovation networks by examining email archives from W3C working groups. The researchers developed visualization tools to map how information flows through these global internet-based teams over time. They found that different groups displayed distinct communication structures and identified both formal and informal leadership patterns that shaped how innovation networks organized themselves.
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Creating Employee Networks That Deliver Open Innovation
A small group of employees—designated as 'idea scouts' and 'idea connectors'—drive disproportionate success in open innovation initiatives. These individuals are critical to generating valuable outcomes, and companies that deliberately connect and leverage these key people achieve better innovation results.
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Phase Transfer‐Catalyzed Fast CO<sub>2</sub> Absorption by MgO‐Based Absorbents with High Cycling Capacity
Researchers developed a new CO2 absorption method using magnesium oxide and molten salts. The molten salts dissolve the oxide and create triple-phase boundaries where CO2 reacts more efficiently than in traditional gas-solid reactions. This approach works with other basic metal oxides and molten salts, offering a new design strategy for absorbent systems.
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A Tale of Open Data Innovations in Five Smart Cities
This study examines 18 open data initiatives across five smart cities—Barcelona, Chicago, Manchester, Amsterdam, and Helsinki—to understand how open data shapes urban innovation. The research reveals how open data initiatives adapt to different city contexts and what innovations they enable across various urban domains, governance structures, and datasets within each city's open data ecosystem.
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Open Innovation and Stakeholder Engagement
Open innovation creates tension between gaining external knowledge and protecting intellectual property. This paper proposes a process-based model integrating stakeholder engagement with open innovation. By involving stakeholders directly, organizations can better understand and manage the risks of sharing knowledge while generating broader value beyond acquiring specific external expertise.
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Spatial and Social Networks in Organizational Innovation
This paper examines how physical workspace layout influences social networks and organizational innovation. The authors argue that spatial design—through boundaries, accessibility, and visibility—shapes how people circulate, interact, and become aware of each other, which in turn affects the social networks that drive innovation. The paper reviews relevant theories and presents preliminary findings on how spatial arrangement supports or hinders innovation in organizations.
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Reverse innovation: a global growth strategy that could pre‐empt disruption at home
Western companies typically innovate in wealthy markets then adapt products for emerging economies. Reverse innovation flips this approach: companies develop low-cost solutions for emerging markets that later find profitable applications in wealthy countries. GE's portable ultrasound machine exemplifies this—created for China, it generated a $250 million global business with new uses in the USA and other advanced economies.
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Extending open innovation throughout the value chain by small and medium-sized manufacturers
Small and medium-sized US manufacturers widely adopt open innovation practices with customers and suppliers across their value chains. The study of 293 companies shows that open innovation practices significantly influence both product and process innovation outcomes. Effectiveness depends on carefully selecting which practices and partners to engage, extending beyond the traditional focus on research and development.
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ADVANCING A TYPOLOGY OF OPEN INNOVATION
This paper develops a typology of open innovation strategies by reviewing existing research and identifying four distinct approaches: innovation seekers, innovation providers, intermediaries, and open innovators. Each strategy combines different sources of innovation, firm characteristics, and inter-organizational exchange mechanisms to produce different outcomes. The typology provides a conceptual framework for understanding how organizations pursue open innovation and suggests directions for future research.
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Measuring open innovation practices through topic modelling: Revisiting their impact on firm financial performance
This study uses topic modelling and natural language processing to analyze companies' open innovation practices and their effect on financial performance. The researchers find that overall openness improves firm performance, but specific practices show mixed results with some displaying inverted U-shaped relationships. The impact of open innovation varies by sector and by how well internal R&D complements individual practices. The findings show open innovation's effects are nuanced with no universal best practices.
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Which pathway to good ideas? <scp>A</scp> n attention‐based view of innovation in social networks
People embedded in constrained networks generate good ideas through interrogation—deeply focusing attention on information from a single contact to develop domain-specific insights. Those in less constrained networks produce ideas through recombination, dividing attention across multiple contacts. In constrained networks, interrogation proves more reliable than recombination for generating good ideas.
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The Three Stages of Disruptive Innovation: Idea Generation, Incubation, and Scaling
Large established firms can successfully develop disruptive innovations by mastering three distinct disciplines: generating new business ideas through ideation, validating those ideas in the market through incubation, and growing successful ventures through scaling. Amazon and IBM demonstrate effective approaches across all three stages.
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Road Map For Diffusion Of Innovation In Health Care
Healthcare providers either adopt innovations too slowly or too quickly without proper testing, causing harm. This paper examines clinical failures from premature adoption and proposes an integrated roadmap for safely diffusing medical innovations. The framework emphasizes translating knowledge into practice, assessing changes systematically, standardizing intervention descriptions, and using technology to manage knowledge sharing across institutions.
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Policy Diffusion and the Pro-innovation Bias
This paper examines policy diffusion across U.S. states using interstate compacts as a case study. The authors find that existing diffusion research focuses only on widely adopted policies, creating a bias that distorts findings. By analyzing all interstate compacts with variable adoption rates, they show this bias leads researchers to overestimate geographic and policy factors while underestimating professional networks and learning from prior adoptions.
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Emerging needs of social innovators and social innovation ecosystems
Social innovators tackle major societal challenges but receive little research attention compared to profit-oriented entrepreneurs. This study interviewed 28 social innovators to identify their distinct needs and developed a social innovation ecosystem model based on Isenberg's entrepreneurial ecosystem framework. The findings reveal both similarities and differences between social and entrepreneurial ecosystems, showing that social innovators require tailored support structures beyond traditional business models.
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Responsible innovation: motivations for a new journal
This paper introduces the concept of responsible innovation as a framework for understanding technology's role in shaping society. The authors argue that technology is not a neutral tool but an active force that reshapes the world, requiring deliberate governance and stakeholder engagement to ensure innovation serves broader social values and addresses potential harms.
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Absorptive Capacity and the Effects of Foreign Direct Investment and Equity Foreign Portfolio Investment on Economic Growth
This study analyzes 80 countries from 1979 to 1998 and finds that foreign direct investment and equity foreign portfolio investment do not automatically boost economic growth. Instead, their positive effects depend on a country's absorptive capacity—particularly its financial and institutional development. Stronger institutions enable countries to effectively use foreign investment for growth.
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Citizen participation in public administration: investigating open government for social innovation
Local governments increasingly adopt open innovation platforms to engage citizens in generating social innovations. This study examines what motivates citizens to participate in a government ideation platform. The researchers find that intrinsic motivation drives content creation and consumption, while external pressures discourage active contributions. However, external regulation does encourage citizens to evaluate others' ideas, showing that different motivations drive different participation behaviors.
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The role of contracts and intellectual property rights in open innovation
Firms engaged in open innovation strongly prefer formal contracts to govern their collaborative relationships with other firms. Despite open innovation's collaborative nature, companies still view intellectual property rights as critical for protecting their innovations. The study finds that firms' openness, legal orientation, competitive market conditions, and internal R&D strength all influence how much firms prioritize intellectual property protection in open innovation partnerships.
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The Role of Ego Network Structure in Facilitating Ego Network Innovations
This paper examines how the structure of a firm's supply chain network affects innovation output. Using patent data from manufacturing joint ventures, the researchers find that network characteristics like betweenness, density, brokerage, and tie weakness significantly influence innovation. The study shows that firms innovate more effectively when they strategically leverage their network connections, not just through individual capability or knowledge.
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Kindred spirits or intergovernmental competition? The innovation and diffusion of energy policies in the American states (1990–2008)
States adopt energy and climate policies primarily through learning within peer groups sharing similar political cultures, rather than through geographic proximity. Using event history analysis of U.S. state policies from 1990–2008, the authors find that political ideology and culture drive policy adoption far more than environmental conditions or economic resources. Geographic diffusion models that ignore political culture produce biased results.
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Supply chain innovation diffusion: going beyond adoption
This paper develops a unified framework for understanding how supply chain innovations move beyond initial adoption to become fully embedded in organizations. The authors identify 17 activities across three post-adoption stages—acceptance, routinization, and assimilation—and map relationships between them. The framework guides both researchers and supply chain managers in implementing innovations completely rather than simply adopting them.
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Identifying and describing constituents of innovation ecosystems
This paper systematically reviews 30 publications on innovation ecosystems to clarify how scholars define and study them. The authors identify different approaches across industries and organizational levels, examining how value is created and captured, the role of orchestrators, and success factors. They find European and American scholars emphasize different aspects, and note that most research focuses on European contexts. The review provides practitioners with management guidance for establishing and managing innovation ecosystems.
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Institutional Complexity as a Driver for Innovation in Service Ecosystems
Institutional complexity—when actors face conflicting institutional arrangements—drives innovation in service ecosystems. The paper argues that this complexity activates problem-solving and provides multiple cultural and material toolkits that actors use to jointly reconstruct value creation practices and change institutional arrangements. This reconciles institutional stability with actor-driven creation of novel solutions.
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How Do Low-Income Urban African Americans and Latinos Feel about Telemedicine? A Diffusion of Innovation Analysis
Low-income African American and Latino urban residents view telemedicine as improving access to specialists and reducing wait times. However, African Americans express greater concerns about privacy and the lack of in-person contact, likely due to historical medical mistrust, while Latino immigrants show more openness. Successful telemedicine adoption requires tailored strategies that address these distinct community perspectives.
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Networks and Innovation: Accounting for Structural and Institutional Sources of Recombination in Brokerage Triads
This paper examines how firms combine knowledge across structural and institutional boundaries to drive innovation. Using biotechnology R&D alliances, the authors show that different network configurations produce different innovation outcomes: domestic partnerships increase innovation volume, foreign partnerships boost radical innovation, and mixed partnerships balance both. The findings reveal that institutional boundaries matter as much as network structure in shaping how firms recombine knowledge.
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Examining Absorptive Capacity in Supply Chains: Linking Responsive Strategy and Firm Performance
This study examines how manufacturing firms use absorptive capacity—their ability to process information from customers and suppliers—to improve performance. Analysis of 711 firms shows that absorptive capacity fully mediates the link between responsive strategy and firm performance, making it essential for delivering innovative products. Firms blending efficient and responsive strategies struggle to develop absorptive capacity, following a U-shaped relationship pattern.
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Innovation Ecosystems as Structures for Value Co-Creation
Innovation ecosystems enable value creation through collaborative networks rather than isolated firm activities. The paper argues that both service providers and customers participate in large external networks to generate value together. This shift moves away from viewing innovation as something companies do alone toward recognizing it as a dynamic, interconnected process involving multiple stakeholders working in concert.
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Absorptive capacity and localized spillovers: focal firms as technological gatekeepers in industrial districts
In Italy's automatic packaging machinery cluster, large focal firms act as technological gatekeepers, absorbing external knowledge and redistributing it locally. The study of 720 patents shows district firms prefer local knowledge, focal firms access external sources more than others, and non-focal firms disproportionately build on focal firms' innovations. Geography and firm size shape how knowledge flows through industrial districts.
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Beating competitors to international markets: The value of geographically balanced networks for innovation
Technology-based ventures that balance local and foreign network connections develop innovations faster for international markets than those relying on either type alone. The advantage of geographic network balance grows stronger when innovations are more complex or when industries move faster. This finding challenges the debate over whether local or foreign partners matter more for innovation.
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Managing Peer-to-Peer Conflicts in Disruptive Information Technology Innovations: The Case of Software Reuse1
Software reuse represents a disruptive innovation in development organizations that triggers peer-to-peer conflicts. The paper develops a model explaining these conflicts and shows that managerial interventions—including coordination mechanisms and organizational learning practices—reduce conflict and improve program success. A study of four organizations confirmed that companies implementing these interventions achieved better outcomes with software reuse adoption.
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Towards innovation in Living Labs networks
Living Labs are open, user-centered environments that enable networked innovation through collaboration between organizations, users, and other participants. This study examines a regional Living Labs initiative to identify key participants, their roles, motivations, and outcomes. The research finds that Living Labs successfully facilitate open innovation by integrating users as co-producers in product development, which uncovers hidden user needs and generates unexpected results.
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The Emergence of China and India as New Competitors in MNCs' Innovation Networks
Multinational corporations increasingly locate research and development operations in China and India, moving beyond traditional innovation hubs in North America, Western Europe, and Japan. However, this shift remains limited in scope, with China attracting market-seeking investment and India attracting resource-seeking investment. Knowledge control stays concentrated in developed countries despite local learning and upgrading. While concerns about Western innovation decline are overstated, these trends signal a potential long-term redistribution of global innovation capacity and economic power.
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Developing and Validating Field Measurement Scales for Absorptive Capacity and Experienced Community of Practice
Researchers developed and validated survey measurement scales for absorptive capacity (the ability to transform new knowledge into usable knowledge) and experienced community of practice (engagement with a practice community). Testing with nearly 600 engineers across two Fortune 100 technology companies, they confirmed the scales are internally consistent, relate meaningfully to organizational variables, and provide distinct explanatory power for studying knowledge transfer in organizations.
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Managerial Social Networks and Ambidexterity of SMEs: The Moderating Role of a Proactive Commitment to Innovation
Top managers' extensive social networks inside and outside their firms help small and medium-sized technology companies achieve ambidexterity—the ability to pursue both existing and new business directions simultaneously. However, networks only drive innovation when managers actively commit to pursuing innovative opportunities. The study of SME leaders confirms that network breadth matters, but only when paired with genuine proactive commitment to innovation.
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Diffusion of Safety Innovations in the Construction Industry
Construction firms have widely adopted traditional safety innovations like worksite inspections and safety training, but adoption rates plateau for newer strategies like substance abuse programs and site safety manager positions. Internal organizational factors drive adoption more than external influences. The industry has saturated with conventional injury prevention approaches and needs novel safety innovations to continue improving performance.
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Diffusion of surgical innovation among patients with kidney cancer
Surgical innovation adoption for kidney cancer depends primarily on surgeon practice styles rather than patient characteristics. Among 5,483 Medicare patients who underwent kidney cancer surgery between 1997 and 2002, surgeon factors accounted for 18% of variation in partial nephrectomy use and 37% of variation in laparoscopic surgery use—substantially more than patient or tumor factors. Removing barriers to surgeon adoption of these techniques could improve care quality.
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NETWORK STRUCTURE AND INNOVATION AMBIGUITY EFFECTS ON DIFFUSION IN DYNAMIC ORGANIZATIONAL FIELDS.
Computational modeling shows how network structures affect innovation diffusion differently depending on whether innovations have clear or ambiguous benefits. Regional constraints slow diffusion of ambiguous innovations but help spread clearly beneficial ones. Partnering patterns and interregional connections significantly influence which innovations spread through organizational fields.
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Focusing the ecosystem lens on innovation studies
This paper reviews how innovation research has shifted toward understanding innovation as embedded in ecosystems of interconnected actors—firms, organizations, and individuals—that create value together through modular interfaces. The authors synthesize nine articles examining how ecosystem actors coordinate, create joint value, and capture returns, while proposing future research directions that combine ecosystem perspectives with other innovation frameworks and develop new methodologies for studying ecosystem dynamics.
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Social Capital of Young Technology Firms and Their IPO Values: The Complementary Role of Relevant Absorptive Capacity
Young technology firms with strong business-to-business relationships achieve higher IPO valuations when they possess absorptive capacity—the ability to leverage external resources. The study of 177 IPOs shows that social capital from supplier, customer, and investor networks only translates to financial value if firms can actually use those connections. Marketing and R&D relationships without absorptive capacity actually harm firm value.
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Diffusion of Innovation: Embedding Simulation into Nursing Curricula
Nursing programs face resistance when adopting simulation-based teaching despite documented learning benefits. This paper describes how one large, multi-site nursing program successfully embedded simulation into its undergraduate curriculum by using Diffusion of Innovation theory to guide faculty adoption. The authors identify techniques that overcame barriers and achieved widespread integration, offering practical strategies for other nursing programs seeking to implement similar innovations.
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Triple Helix Clusters: Boundary Permeability at University—Industry—Government Interfaces as a Regional Innovation Strategy
Successful regional innovation requires permeable boundaries between universities, industry, and government. The paper examines MIT-Boston, Stanford-Silicon Valley, Research Triangle-North Carolina, and Newcastle-Northeast UK to show that entrepreneurial universities drive innovation regions. While no single best-practice model exists, boundary permeability and other common innovation characteristics can be strengthened through targeted policy initiatives.
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The Role of Innovation Ecosystems and Social Capital in Startup Survival
Startups that actively collaborate with universities, industries, and government organizations significantly survive longer than those that don't, according to analysis of the Kauffman Firm Survey. However, the amount of social capital available in innovation ecosystems doesn't predict whether startups actually use it or live longer. The effect varies between high-tech and other startups. Active engagement with ecosystem partners matters more than ecosystem density alone.
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Does patenting help or hinder open innovation? Evidence from new entrants in the solar industry
New companies entering the solar industry that build patent portfolios increase their open innovation partnerships overall. However, the effect varies by relationship type. Patents strongly boost partnerships in high-tech collaborations but weaken the effect in lower-tech relationships, actually reducing partnerships in the least technology-intensive ones.
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Rapid innovation diffusion in social networks
This paper establishes that innovations spread rapidly through social networks when the payoff advantage is sufficiently large and agents make noisy decisions. The researchers derive bounds showing diffusion speed depends primarily on payoff gains and decision noise rather than network structure. They demonstrate that with realistic parameters—such as 5% error rates and 150% payoff gains—innovations establish themselves across any network within 80 revision periods on average.
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Factors influencing pharmacists’ adoption of prescribing: qualitative application of the diffusion of innovations theory
When Alberta granted pharmacists prescribing privileges in 2007, adoption varied widely among practitioners. Pharmacists adopted prescribing based on four factors: the innovation's characteristics, individual adopter traits, system readiness, and physician relationships. Those in patient-focused settings and with higher self-efficacy adopted prescribing more readily. Physician relationships significantly influenced whether pharmacists pursued independent prescribing privileges.
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Organizational change and the dynamics of innovation: Formal R&D structure and intrafirm inventor networks
Centralizing R&D budget authority in diversified firms increases connections between internal inventors, leading to broader innovation that spans more technologies. Decentralization does not reverse this effect. The paper shows that formal organizational structure influences innovation outcomes through changes in inventor collaboration networks, though organizational inertia creates time lags in these effects.
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How open innovation processes vary between urban and remote environments: slow innovators, market-sourced information and frequency of interaction
The paper challenges the assumption that innovation happens mainly in cities. It shows that remote areas do produce first-to-market innovations, but through different mechanisms. Slow innovators in isolated locations rely on non-market information and infrequent contact with others, while fast innovators cluster near cities using market-sourced information and frequent interactions. This difference explains why innovation occurs in both settings.
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Diffusion of Innovations and the Theory of Planned Behavior in Information Systems Research: A Metaanalysis
This meta-analysis examines how well Diffusion of Innovations and Theory of Planned Behavior predict technology adoption in information systems research. Analyzing 58 empirical studies, the authors found that attitude toward behavior, relative advantage, and compatibility are the strongest predictors of adoption, while complexity negatively affects it. These relationships hold consistently across different studies, validating core assumptions in IS innovation research.
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Open data outcomes: U.S. cities between product and process innovation
U.S. cities have created open data portals to increase government transparency, but this generates broader innovation outcomes than typically recognized. Research with 15 city managers reveals that open data drives two types of innovation: external product innovation (apps, websites, services) and internal process innovation (procedural changes, cultural shifts). The study recommends structural, procedural, and cultural changes to maximize open data initiative success.
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Triple Helix and the evolution of ecosystems of innovation: the case of Silicon Valley
Silicon Valley's innovation ecosystem has transformed over the past decade. The study tracks how the Triple Helix agents—universities, industry, and government—have shifted their roles and interactions. Key changes include the emergence of accelerator programs, corporations engaging startups earlier, geographic expansion into San Francisco, universities investing in capital funds, and the rise of micro-multinationals responding to talent competition.
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Reconciling the Dilemma of Knowledge Sharing: A Network Pluralism Framework of Firms’ R&D Alliance Network and Innovation Performance
Firms face a dilemma: R&D alliances provide access to external knowledge but risk knowledge leakage. This study shows that industrial networks strengthen the relationship between alliance networks and innovation performance in an inverted U-shape, while political connections weaken it. A firm's technological capability amplifies these network effects.
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How does organisational absorptive capacity matter in the assimilation of enterprise information systems?
Organizations adopt enterprise resource planning systems through both internal learning capabilities and external institutional pressures. This study shows that absorptive capacity—an organization's ability to learn and apply new knowledge—moderates how institutional pressures influence ERP adoption. Potential absorptive capacity strengthens responses to competitive mimicry, while realized absorptive capacity strengthens responses to professional norms. Both dimensions directly improve system assimilation.
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National Intervention and the Diffusion of Policy Innovations
National legislation influences whether states adopt policy innovations in human services, even without mandates or financial incentives. Using event history analysis of three policy innovations—individual development accounts, family caps, and medical savings accounts—the study finds that national intervention affects state adoption by either reducing obstacles to innovation or providing resources to overcome them. National action that addresses neither factor has no significant effect on state decisions.
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Managing Open Innovation: A Project-Level Perspective
This study examines how innovation project characteristics—specifically complexity and uncertainty—influence successful open innovation management. Using survey data from 201 American innovation projects, the authors identify five key management factors: openness level, external partner selection, mechanism choice, collaboration formalization, and internal practices. The research demonstrates that project-level attributes matter more than firm-level characteristics alone for managing open innovation effectively.
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Using innovation diffusion theory to guide collaboration technology evaluation: work in progress
Researchers developed a survey instrument based on innovation diffusion theory to evaluate collaboration technology adoption. The survey measures five key attributes—relative advantage, compatibility, complexity, trialability, and observability—that influence whether groups adopt new systems. The team tested whether face-to-face versus distributed use affects adoption attitudes and refined the survey's reliability and validity for early-stage technology evaluation.
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Network Closure or Structural Hole? The Conditioning Effects of Network–Level Social Capital on Innovation Performance
This study examines how network-level social capital affects firm innovation performance. Using simulation data, the researchers found that network density moderates the impact of firm-level social capital measures on innovation. In sparse networks, both direct connections and bridging positions enhance innovation. In dense networks, direct connections become less valuable and bridging positions actually harm innovation performance.
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Punctuated Equilibrium Theory and the Diffusion of Innovations
Punctuated equilibrium theory explains how public policy innovations spread across U.S. states through three distinct mechanisms: gradual emulation, rapid imitation between states, and immediate responses to shared external shocks. Using the Bass diffusion model on 81 policy innovations, the research measures how external and internal influences drive adoption patterns and shows that policy image and federal involvement shape diffusion timing and speed.
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The Effect of Employer Networks on Workplace Innovation and Training
Establishments whose managers participate in industry associations, civic organizations, and multi-unit firm networks adopt high-performance work practices and employee training programs more frequently and intensively than isolated firms. Managers embedded in multiple networks show the strongest commitment to work reorganization and training. Social ties between organizations drive organizational learning and innovation diffusion.
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The Impact of Higher Education on Entrepreneurship and the Innovation Ecosystem: A Case Study in Mexico
A Master's program in technology commercialization at the University of Texas trained Mexican students in business creation methodologies. Survey data from 109 graduates shows the program successfully generated technology-based startups and built entrepreneurial skills. The research demonstrates that higher education can strengthen innovation ecosystems by connecting students, businesses, and technology transfer, offering a model other Latin American countries could adopt.
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Financialized Corporations in a National Innovation System: The U.S. Pharmaceutical Industry
U.S. pharmaceutical companies face a productivity crisis despite favorable institutional conditions for drug development. The paper argues that financialization—prioritizing shareholder returns through stock buybacks and dividends over R&D investment—explains this paradox. Driven by stock-based executive compensation, major U.S. firms extract value for shareholders at innovation's expense, while less-financialized European competitors successfully exploit the U.S. innovation system. The authors contend that corporate governance prioritizing innovation could unlock greater pharmaceutical productivity.
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Too much and too fast? Public investment scaling-up and absorptive capacity
Rapid scaling-up of public investment in low-income countries reduces project success rates when absorptive capacity—skills, institutions, and management capability—is limited. Analysis of World Bank projects across 80 countries from 1970 to 2007 shows projects implemented during investment scaling periods perform worse, though the effect is modest, particularly in poor and capital-scarce nations.
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Open innovation for SMEs in developing countries – An intermediated communication network model for collaboration beyond obstacles
SMEs in developing countries face significant barriers to innovation that their counterparts in developed nations do not. This paper proposes that government agencies can establish innovation hubs to connect SMEs with independent inventors and collaborators, enabling open innovation practices. The authors present a joint innovation model and test it against cases from developing countries to demonstrate how intermediated communication networks overcome obstacles to SME innovation.
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Nonprofit Service Continuity and Responses in the Pandemic: Disruptions, Ambiguity, Innovation, and Challenges
Nonprofit organizations providing homeless support services rapidly adapted their operations during the COVID-19 pandemic, driven by government mandates and urgent human needs. Using interviews and website analysis, researchers identified how these organizations innovated to maintain service continuity despite disruptions and ambiguity. The study reveals that nonprofits demonstrated agility and developed practical adaptations that offer lessons for managing service delivery during crises.
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Unpacking Open Innovation: Absorptive Capacity, Exploratory and Exploitative Openness, and the Growth of Entrepreneurial Biopharmaceutical Firms
Absorptive capacity and external relationships drive growth in small biopharmaceutical firms. A study of 349 firms across the US, UK, France, and Germany shows that a firm's ability to recognize and use external knowledge matters significantly for expansion. Exploratory partnerships depend on sustained R&D investment, while exploitative partnerships require stronger internal knowledge absorption capabilities.
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Linking Resilience Theory and Diffusion of Innovations Theory to Understand the Potential for Perennials in the U.S. Corn Belt
This paper combines resilience theory with diffusion of innovations theory to analyze how perennial crops could be adopted in the U.S. Corn Belt. The authors examine the conditions and barriers that affect whether farmers will shift from annual commodity crops to perennial alternatives, using theoretical frameworks to understand both the ecological benefits of such transitions and the social factors driving agricultural innovation adoption.
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High Capacity Hydrogen Absorption in Transition Metal-Ethylene Complexes Observed via Nanogravimetry
Researchers used nanogravimetry to measure hydrogen absorption in transition metal-ethylene complexes created through laser ablation. Titanium-ethylene complexes absorbed 12 weight percent hydrogen at room temperature with rapid kinetics. Deuterium substitution doubled the uptake, and mass spectroscopy identified a species at 78 amu as the likely hydrogen-absorbing compound.
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Interfirm Exchange and Innovation in Platform Ecosystems: Evidence from Apple’s Worldwide Developers Conference
Apple's Worldwide Developers Conference creates opportunities for app developers to exchange knowledge and collaborate. The study finds that developers attending the conference released more major app updates with positive consumer feedback. Larger and more established firms benefited most, likely because they had greater resources and experience to leverage these exchanges. Learning and collaboration accounted for part of these innovation gains.
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Determinants of Retailers’ Cross-channel Integration: An Innovation Diffusion Perspective on Omni-channel Retailing
Retailers in the U.S. adopt cross-channel integration based on their information-technology capabilities and private-label offerings, according to an innovation diffusion framework. Moderate product diversity supports integration better than high or low diversity. Financial resources matter more when industry concentration is high. The study identifies technology, organizational, and environmental factors driving omni-channel retail adoption.
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An alter-centric perspective on employee innovation: The importance of alters’ creative self-efficacy and network structure.
Employee innovation depends on the creative self-efficacy and innovation behavior of their social network contacts. A study of 144 U.S. product development workers found that employees with network contacts who have high creative self-efficacy and strong innovation behavior generate and implement more novel ideas themselves. This effect strengthens when those contacts have less densely connected networks. Employees with initially low creative self-efficacy also gain confidence when connected to high-efficacy contacts.
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Information–Communication Technologies Open up Innovation
Information and communication technologies enable open innovation by connecting organizations with external sources like customers, suppliers, and vendors to generate, develop, test, and commercialize ideas. ICTs support the entire innovation process from initial ideation through commercialization, moving beyond internal use to facilitate distributed innovation across organizational boundaries.
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Asymmetry of the technological cycle of disruptive innovations
This paper develops a model to measure how disruptive technologies grow relative to established technologies in competitive markets. Using the US music recording industry as a case study, the research finds that disruptive technologies grow disproportionately fast, follow an asymmetric cycle with longer growth phases than decline phases, and undergo multiple technological advances that enable market dominance. The findings expand disruptive innovation theory and offer management guidance.
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Antitrust and Innovation: Welcoming and Protecting Disruption
Antitrust policy should protect competition because rivalry drives firms to innovate. Horizontal mergers between competitors reduce innovation incentives by eliminating parallel R&D efforts, though merger synergies may offset this harm. Dominant firms may use exclusionary conduct to suppress disruptive competitors, which reduces both the threat of disruption and incumbent incentives to innovate. The authors develop a taxonomy of merger cases and exclusionary strategies using US and EU examples.
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The social network side of individual innovation
This meta-analysis examines how social network properties affect individual innovation. Brokerage—having connections across different groups—most strongly predicts innovation, followed by network size and diversity. Closure and strong ties show weaker effects. The study reveals that network size and strength influence innovation indirectly through brokerage and diversity, and that strong ties create tradeoffs with both positive and negative innovation effects.
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Interdependence, Perception, and Investment Choices: An Experimental Approach to Decision Making in Innovation Ecosystems
Decision makers systematically overestimate success in interdependent innovation projects. When success probabilities are presented separately for each partner rather than as a combined probability, people become more optimistic, especially with more partners involved. This leads to inflated project valuations, adding unnecessary partners, and overinvestment in individual components. The pattern holds across different risk contexts and participant groups from students to executives.
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Motivation and sorting of human capital in open innovation
This paper examines how open innovation projects attract and retain contributors with different motivations. Using open source software data, the authors show that developers sort themselves based on project characteristics, particularly licensing choices. Intrinsic motivation, reputation building, and career signaling drive contributions more than reciprocity. Project managers can strategically design business models to attract the right talent and improve performance.
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Absorptive capacity: a proposed operationalization
This paper develops a practical framework for measuring absorptive capacity—a company's ability to acquire, assimilate, transform, and exploit new knowledge. The authors examine ten innovative companies to test their operationalization approach, connecting absorptive capacity to dynamic capabilities and business strategy. The research provides concrete methods for assessing how firms actually absorb and use external knowledge.
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Designing High-Capacity, Lithium-Ion Cathodes Using X-ray Absorption Spectroscopy
This paper is not about rural innovation. It describes laboratory research on lithium-ion battery cathode materials using X-ray spectroscopy techniques. The authors demonstrate how surface treatments with lithium-nickel-phosphate solutions improve battery performance by modifying the chemical structure of composite cathode materials, offering a method for synthesizing improved electrodes for lithium-ion batteries.
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Sources of Variation in the Efficiency of Adopting Management Innovation: The Role of Absorptive Capacity Routines, Managerial Attention and Organizational Legitimacy
This paper examines how firms efficiently adopt management innovations through two case studies of offshore business service sourcing. The research shows that absorptive capacity routines—the processes firms use to learn and implement new practices—vary in their effectiveness depending on their sequence, adequacy, and interdependencies. Managerial attention and organizational legitimacy emerge as critical factors determining adoption speed and success. Top-level change agents prove more effective than local problem-solving at directing attention and building support for both the innovation and the routines needed to implement it.
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Science, business, and innovation: understanding networks in technology‐based incubators
This study examines how networks form within a Canadian technology-based incubator. The research reveals that incubators generate multiple distinct types of networks rather than a single uniform phenomenon. The authors identify specific factors that enable or constrain network formation among high-tech firms and other organizations. The findings emphasize that inter-organizational interactions in incubators are more complex and varied than previously understood.
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Realized and Potential Absorptive Capacity: Understanding Their Antecedents and Performance in the Sourcing Context
This paper develops a conceptual model explaining how companies successfully absorb knowledge from sourcing relationships. It distinguishes between potential absorptive capacity at the interorganizational level and realized absorptive capacity at the intraorganizational level. The model identifies knowledge, relational, and institutional contexts as drivers of potential capacity, while social embeddedness and interfunctional coupling within organizations enable knowledge integration and realization.
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Growing Innovation Ecosystems: University-Industry Knowledge Transfer and Regional Economic Development in Canada
This paper examines how university-industry knowledge transfer drives regional economic development in Canada. The authors analyze the mechanisms through which universities contribute to innovation ecosystems and regional growth, focusing on the role of knowledge exchange partnerships between academic institutions and industry in fostering innovation capacity and economic competitiveness across Canadian regions.
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The Changing Structure of American Cities: A Study of the Diffusion of Innovation
American cities have restructured over 50 years following innovation diffusion patterns. Mayor-council cities adopted council-manager features to improve efficiency, while council-manager cities adopted mayor-council features to increase responsiveness. The result is a convergence toward hybrid governance models that blur traditional distinctions between the two forms.
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Reconciling Models of Diffusion and Innovation: A Theory of the Productivity Distribution and Technology Frontier
This paper develops a theory explaining how firms' choices to innovate, adopt new technology, or continue with existing methods shape the overall productivity distribution and drive economic growth. Innovation stretches the productivity gap between best and worst firms, while technology adoption compresses it. The balance between these forces determines growth rates. Adoption conditions influence innovation incentives through technology licensing and the value of waiting to adopt, ultimately affecting long-run growth.
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Variety of national innovation systems (NIS) and alternative pathways to growth beyond the middle-income stage: Balanced, imbalanced, catching-up, and trapped NIS
This study analyzes national innovation systems across 32–35 economies using patent data to identify pathways for growth beyond middle-income status. The research identifies five distinct innovation system clusters and confirms two successful catching-up pathways: balanced systems (Ireland, Spain, Hong Kong, Singapore) and imbalanced systems (Korea, Taiwan, China). Other economies remain trapped in middle-income status due to opposite characteristics in technology cycle time, originality, localization, and diversification.
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The Effects of Diversity and Network Ties on Innovations
This study analyzes how diversity affects innovation in scientific collaboration. Using data from 1,354 researchers who created the Oncofertility field through 469 publications, the authors find that innovation benefits from both homophily and diversity. Shared country residence and prior collaborations reduce uncertainty, while cognitive diversity enables the knowledge recombination necessary for breakthrough innovation.
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Distributed Innovation in Classes of Networks
Digital technologies reshape innovation by reducing communication costs and enabling convergence, creating distributed innovation networks. The authors propose a framework identifying four network types: singular innovation, open source innovation, internal markets of innovation, and doubly distributed innovation networks. These emerge from increasing distribution of control among actors and growing heterogeneity in knowledge resources mobilized during innovation processes.
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How frugal innovation shape global sustainable supply chains during the pandemic crisis: lessons from the COVID-19
During the COVID-19 pandemic, frugal innovation emerged informally across global supply chains to address critical shortages of medical equipment and supplies. This study identifies key drivers of frugal-oriented sustainable supply chains in emerging countries, finding that government support, policies, and regulations—mediated by leadership and moderated by national culture—drive adoption of new technologies, volunteering, and ethical practices, which in turn strengthen supply chain talent and frugal engineering capabilities.
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The evolution of cooperation in the face of conflict: Evidence from the innovation ecosystem for mobile telecom standards development
This study examines how firms cooperate within innovation ecosystems despite patent litigation conflicts. Using data from mobile telecom standards development, the authors find that firms increase cooperation with litigation opponents while simultaneously strengthening ties with other partners to influence standards direction. Technological complementarities and network position determine whether firms pursue direct cooperation with adversaries or alternative partnerships.
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Do Individual Employees' Learning Goal Orientation and Civic Virtue Matter? A Micro‐Foundations Perspective on Firm Absorptive Capacity
Individual employee characteristics drive firm absorptive capacity—the ability to identify, assimilate, and exploit external knowledge. Employees with learning goal orientation strengthen both potential and realized absorptive capacity. Civic virtue, employees' discretionary involvement in company issues, acts as a social integration mechanism that bridges the gap between potential and realized absorptive capacity in high-technology firms.
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Forecasting the market diffusion of disruptive and discontinuous innovation
This paper develops a forecasting model for disruptive and discontinuous innovations that accounts for multiple markets and learning curve effects. The model integrates diffusion forecasting theory with disruptive innovation literature and provides practical guidelines for application. The work addresses the growing need to predict market adoption of disruptive innovations as technological convergence accelerates.
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Crowdsourcing without profit: the role of the seeker in open social innovation
Government agencies use crowdsourcing to solve social problems by engaging citizens, a practice called citizensourcing. This study of 18 local government agencies reveals that government crowdsourcing differs fundamentally from corporate crowdsourcing because both seekers and solvers are motivated by non-monetary goals. The researchers show how government organizational choices, team capabilities, and engagement strategies directly shape crowdsourcing project outcomes and success.
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What Health System Challenges Should Responsible Innovation in Health Address? Insights From an International Scoping Review
This scoping review of 254 studies across 99 countries identifies major health system challenges that responsible innovation should address. Service delivery, human resources, and governance emerge as the most frequent challenges globally. The analysis reveals that innovations often increase human resource demands, worsen service delivery when requiring highly skilled users, and create different pressures depending on country development levels. Rural areas particularly need flexible IT solutions. The authors argue that innovation development must address broader system vulnerabilities, not just immediate clinical needs.
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Open innovation in digital journalism: Examining the impact of Open APIs at four news organizations
Four major news organizations—The New York Times, The Guardian, USA Today, and NPR—adopted Open APIs to embrace open innovation principles. This shift accelerated research and development through collaboration with web developers, created new revenue streams by expanding their product offerings, and built innovation networks that acted as external R&D teams. The organizations continuously balanced openness with control to manage their intellectual property while benefiting from external innovation.
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Knowledge Diffusion, Trade, and Innovation across Countries and Sectors
This paper develops a framework showing how trade, innovation, and knowledge diffusion interact across countries and sectors. Using an economic model calibrated to real-world data, the authors find that reducing trade costs shifts research and development investment between sectors and changes comparative advantage. Knowledge diffusion varies across sectors and amplifies these specialization effects, creating significant welfare gains.
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Idea Convergence Quality in Open Innovation Crowdsourcing: A Cognitive Load Perspective
Open innovation crowdsourcing generates many ideas but struggles to identify quality ones for development. This study tested how different types of cognitive load affect idea convergence quality using laboratory experiments. Germane cognitive load—mental effort directly supporting the task—improved convergence quality and satisfaction, while intrinsic and extraneous cognitive loads reduced satisfaction. Knowledge self-efficacy, goal clarity, and need for cognition strengthened these positive effects, offering practical guidance for designing crowdsourcing tasks.
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Open innovation in the public sector: creating public value through civic hackathons
Civic hackathons across the United States generate three main outcomes: digital prototypes, public engagement, and government awareness of open data. Public engagement and relationship building prove more valuable than technical prototypes. These open innovation initiatives enhance public value through better outcomes, democratic accountability, and procedural legitimacy, though their impact remains limited by early adoption stages and low external participation rates.
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When do states disrupt industries? Electric cars and the politics of innovation
States successfully drive technological change in mature industries when political competition among interest groups and agencies allows policymakers to build coalitions supporting new technologies, rather than relying on bureaucratic autonomy alone. Comparing Germany and the United States, the authors show that Germany's consensus-based coordination between government and incumbent automakers resulted in weak electric vehicle policy, while the United States' competitive political environment enabled strong intervention that disrupted the auto sector despite industry opposition.
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Venture team human capital and absorptive capacity in high technology new ventures
High-technology startups use acquisitions and joint ventures to acquire new knowledge as existing knowledge becomes obsolete. This study of 340 U.S. high-tech ventures finds that the diversity of skills and experience on the top management team strengthens how well these ventures learn from venturing activities and convert that learning into innovation and financial performance. However, the overall level of management team experience alone does not matter.
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GE's Ecomagination Challenge: An Experiment in Open Innovation
GE's ecomagination Challenge used open innovation to solicit green energy ideas from external entrepreneurs and startups, investing $140 million across 23 ventures by 2011. The case examines whether this approach delivered sufficient returns relative to GE's massive energy business, and considers how the company should measure success and structure future open innovation efforts to generate meaningful commercial outcomes.
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How venture capital became a component of the US National System of Innovation
Venture capital emerged as a key institution within the US national innovation system through a combination of government policies, technological trajectories in information and biomedical industries, and regional concentration. The paper traces how VC became integrated into the broader innovation ecosystem, showing that neither government action alone nor market forces alone explain its rise, but rather their interaction shaped this institutional development.
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From Technopoles to Regional Innovation Systems: The Evolution of Localised Technology Development Policy
This paper traces how governments worldwide adopted policies to build high-technology industry clusters, inspired by Silicon Valley's success in the 1970s-80s. It examines the shift from early technopole initiatives—modeled on Stanford's science park—toward regional innovation systems approaches. The work documents how Stanford's model, pioneered by Frederick Terman, spawned semiconductor companies like Intel and Fairchild, then influenced subsequent government strategies for promoting localized technology development.
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A data-driven robust optimization in viable supply chain network design by considering Open Innovation and Blockchain Technology
This paper develops a supply chain network design model that integrates open innovation and blockchain technology to improve resilience and sustainability. Using robust optimization and risk management techniques, the model minimizes costs while reducing CO2 emissions and energy consumption. The authors demonstrate that adding open innovation and blockchain platforms reduces costs by 0.2% and enhances overall supply chain performance against disruptions.
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Business Model, Open Innovation, and Sustainability in Car Sharing Industry—Comparing Three Economies
Car-sharing companies Uber, DiDi Chuxing, and KakaoT adopt different business models shaped by open innovation strategies and interactions with government, taxi industries, public transit, and automakers. The study finds business models are dynamic rather than fixed, and open innovation approaches directly determine how these firms structure revenue, responsibility, and system operations across the United States, China, and South Korea.
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The evolution and performance of biotechnology regional systems of innovation
Biotechnology regions develop as complex systems beginning with university research and knowledge spillovers, then progressing toward regional technology markets. Universities establish intellectual property and technology transfer offices to sell knowledge, while venture capital firms add biotechnology portfolios. The study of 90 Canadian biotechnology companies finds that firms in regional agglomerations grow faster than isolated ones, and university spin-offs outperform independent start-ups.
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The fall of the innovation empire and its possible rise through open science
The innovation system's effectiveness is declining because research costs rise exponentially while researcher productivity falls, resulting in flat innovation output. Three factors drive this decline: growing scientific complexity, misaligned incentives, and fragmented knowledge. Open science partnerships—public-private collaborations using open access publications, shared data and materials, and minimal intellectual property restrictions—can reverse this trend by improving system efficiency.
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Disruptive Innovation … in Reverse: Adding a Geographical Dimension to Disruptive Innovation Theory
This paper integrates disruptive innovation theory with reverse innovation to explain how emerging economies generate new products and technological solutions. The authors propose a geographical framework for categorizing disruptive innovation, showing that innovations originating in developing regions can challenge established markets globally. The work expands innovation theory by recognizing emerging economies as legitimate sources of disruption rather than mere adopters.
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The combined influence of top and middle management leadership styles on absorptive capacity
This study examines how leadership styles of top and middle managers together influence organizational absorptive capacity—the ability to learn and apply new knowledge. The research finds that different management style combinations work best for different learning types: exploratory learning requires both levels to use transformational leadership, transformative learning works when top management uses transformational and middle management uses transactional styles, and exploitative learning succeeds when both use transactional styles. Organizational context attributes also affect how well these leadership combinations perform.
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MNC KNOWLEDGE TRANSFER, SUBSIDIARY ABSORPTIVE CAPACITY AND HRM.
This study of 169 multinational corporation subsidiaries in the USA, Russia, and Finland shows that human resource management practices strengthen subsidiaries' ability to absorb and apply knowledge from parent companies. The research identifies absorptive capacity as having two components—employee ability and motivation—and demonstrates that when both dimensions work together, knowledge transfer from other parts of the corporation becomes significantly more effective.
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Achieving enhanced electromagnetic shielding and absorption capacity of cellulose-derived carbon aerogels <i>via</i> tuning the carbonization temperature
Researchers developed cellulose-derived carbon aerogels with improved electromagnetic shielding and absorption properties by adjusting carbonization temperature during manufacturing. The simple temperature-tuning approach enhances the material's ability to block and absorb electromagnetic radiation, offering practical applications in shielding technology.
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Under What Conditions Do School Districts Learn From External Partners? The Role of Absorptive Capacity
Two departments in an urban school district worked with the same external partner on improvement efforts, but only one successfully integrated the partner's ideas into policies and routines. The difference stemmed from organizational conditions that foster absorptive capacity—the ability to recognize, assimilate, and apply external knowledge—and the quality of interactions between departments and their partners.
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How Environmental Innovations Emerge and Proliferate in Supply Networks: A Complex Adaptive Systems Perspective
Environmental innovations in supply networks emerge through self-organizing processes that cross organizational boundaries, according to this qualitative study of two firms. The research shows that once innovations enter the network, they spread through decentralized coordination rather than top-down control by dominant firms. The authors develop a process model explaining how environmental innovations come into being and proliferate across supply networks over time.
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Elementary Classroom Teachers’ Adoption of Physical Activity Promotion in the Context of a Statewide Policy: An Innovation Diffusion and Socio-Ecologic Perspective
A study of 201 elementary teachers in South Carolina examined how they adopted physical activity promotion in classrooms following a state policy mandate. Teachers with greater policy awareness and perceived school support were more likely to adopt the practice. The adoption also depended on teachers viewing the activity as compatible, simple, and observable, and on their general innovativeness. The findings identify key factors that influence whether teachers implement policy-driven physical activity initiatives.
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Evolution, roots and influence of the literature on National Systems of Innovation: a bibliometric account
This bibliometric analysis traces the National Systems of Innovation literature from its roots in innovation economics and science policy research through its evolution over 20 years. The field shows irregular publication patterns and lacks a unified analytical framework. While NSI research concentrates in the United Kingdom, Denmark, and the United States, its influence spreads globally across economics, geography, environmental studies, and business disciplines, with citations from scholars worldwide particularly in Latin America and Asia.
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Leveraging Open Innovation Using Intermediary Networks
Open innovation intermediary networks like InnoCentive connect firms seeking solutions with external knowledge holders through one-off transactions. The paper shows that companies successfully source codified and uncodified knowledge through these platforms by applying procurement and design engineering processes to create organizational learning routines. These routines enable effective knowledge transfer and competitive advantage despite theoretical challenges in knowledge search and transfer.
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Jack of All, Master of Some: Information Network and Innovation in Crowdsourcing Communities
Firms that operate both customer support and innovation crowdsourcing communities gain significant advantages. Participants who engage in customer support communities accumulate knowledge about customer needs and solutions, which they then apply to generate higher-quality, more novel and feasible ideas in innovation communities. Companies can identify high-potential innovators by tracking their customer support activities and strategically mobilize them for innovation tasks.
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When do firms undertake open, collaborative activities? Introduction to the special section on open innovation and open business models
This introductory article frames the intellectual context of the World Open Innovation Conference, summarizing four leading papers on open innovation and open business models. The authors synthesize conference submissions and sessions to establish a research agenda for understanding when and why firms engage in collaborative, open innovation activities.
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Prospects for Developing Absorptive Capacity Through Internal Information Provision
Managers can build organizational absorptive capacity by distributing knowledge internally to employees who might adopt new practices. The effectiveness of this information provision depends on what employees already know from other sources. Prior experience with related practices strengthens the impact of managerial information, while knowledge from previous adopters weakens it. This clarifies when absorptive capacity creates lasting competitive advantage.
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The Third Generation of Community Policing: Moving Through Innovation, Diffusion, and Institutionalization
This paper traces community policing's evolution through three distinct generations: innovation, diffusion, and institutionalization. The author argues that community policing has transformed significantly since the late 1970s, and understanding this progression through these three stages clarifies the concept's development and helps predict its future direction in contemporary policing practice.
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Ecosystem effectuation: creating new value through open innovation during a pandemic
During the COVID-19 pandemic, AirAsia transformed its grounded airline operations by building an open innovation ecosystem rather than pursuing incremental improvements. The company created new value by reconfiguring its business model based on available resources and capabilities, introducing the concept of ecosystem effectuation. This case demonstrates how organizations facing financial distress can use radical ambidexterity and open innovation to survive and generate opportunities.
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Aligning sustainability assessment with responsible research and innovation: Towards a framework for Constructive Sustainability Assessment
This paper develops a Constructive Sustainability Assessment framework that combines life-cycle thinking with responsible research and innovation principles to evaluate emerging technologies. The framework uses four design principles—transdisciplinarity, opening-up, exploring uncertainty, and anticipation—and a three-step process involving stakeholder collaboration, sustainability evaluation, and deliberative interpretation. The approach enables scientists, engineers, and policymakers to govern emerging technologies toward sustainability outcomes.
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Communication channels, innovation tasks and NPD project outcomes in innovation‐driven horizontal networks
This study examines how communication channels affect new product development in inter-organizational networks. Analyzing 93 innovation-driven horizontal networks with 372 respondents, the researchers found that tasks requiring less analysis use richer communication channels, which in turn strengthen network ties and reduce development time. Communication channel richness partially mediates the relationship between task complexity and project outcomes.
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Fostering Scaleup Ecosystems for Regional Economic Growth (<i>Innovations Case Narrative</i>: Manizales-Mas and Scale Up Milwaukee)
This paper examines how regions can build scaleup ecosystems to drive economic growth. Using case studies from Manizales, Colombia and Milwaukee, USA, the authors analyze strategies for fostering entrepreneurship and scaling businesses as alternatives to traditional economic development approaches like direct investment attraction and cluster development. The work demonstrates practical methods for creating regional conditions that support growing ventures.
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DataONE: Data Observation Network for Earth Preserving Data and Enabling Innovation in the Biological and Environmental Sciences
DataONE is a federated data network that preserves environmental and biological data while enabling scientific innovation. The system improves data access through secure storage, user-friendly discovery and analysis tools, and community engagement across science, library, and policy sectors. The paper describes DataONE's architecture, data management procedures, and EZID service for managing long-term digital identifiers.
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Diffusion of Innovations as a Theoretical Framework for Telecenters
This paper applies diffusion of innovations theory to understand how rural telecenters—information and communication centers in developing countries—spread and are adopted by local communities. The author examines three key aspects: how people perceive telecenter innovations, how communication drives their adoption, and what consequences result from using them. The framework provides researchers and practitioners with a theoretical foundation for studying telecenter diffusion in rural areas.
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Exploring blockchain adoption intentions in the supply chain: perspectives from innovation diffusion and institutional theory
Supply chain managers are more likely to adopt blockchain technology when government regulations mandate product origin tracking, organizations use modern cloud systems, and engage third-party consultants. The study finds that normative pressures, perceived advantages, compatibility with existing systems, and manageable complexity drive active blockchain adoption. These conditions identify which supply chain networks are ready for blockchain implementation.
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Evolving a Value Chain to an Open Innovation Ecosystem: Cognitive Engagement of Stakeholders in Customizing Medical Implants
A medical device firm transformed its traditional value chain into an open innovation ecosystem to customize orthopedic implants using 3D printing. The company used cognitive artifacts—shared visual and conceptual tools—to help diverse stakeholders develop common understanding and collaborate effectively. This approach enabled the firm to pursue mass customization while avoiding suboptimal local strategies and managing the constraints that external partnerships can impose on innovation strategy.
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Catalyzing capacity: absorptive, adaptive, and generative leadership
This paper proposes a leadership framework for organizations operating in volatile, uncertain, complex, and ambiguous conditions. Leaders who develop three capacities—absorptive, adaptive, and generative—can build organizations that continuously adjust to changing environments. The framework emphasizes diversity, learning, reflection, and humility over traditional command-and-control approaches, offering practical steps for leaders to transform their organizations.
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DiffuNET: The impact of network structure on diffusion of innovation
This paper develops a model linking network structure to innovation diffusion rates. The researchers show that specific network properties—such as centralization—directly influence how quickly innovations spread through populations via innovation and imitation. By redesigning network structures strategically, managers can accelerate product adoption and diffusion. The model integrates previously separate diffusion research traditions and allows practitioners to predict diffusion potential from measurable network characteristics.
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Doctors on-line: using diffusion of innovations theory to understand internet use.
Family physicians in a northeastern U.S. metropolitan area adopt internet use for medical information when they have time to learn and observe its benefits firsthand. Diffusion of innovations theory predicts adoption patterns: physicians need protected time to develop skills and experience usefulness before internet searching becomes routine. Continuing medical education focused on internet skills could increase adoption, while demographic factors like gender or training recency do not affect adoption rates.
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Technological Disruptions in Restaurant Services: Impact of Innovations and Delivery Services
This study examines how food delivery innovations have disrupted restaurant services over the past two decades. The research shows that restaurant delivery service terminology has become as common as fast food service since 2014. The author develops a model showing how technological innovations reshape restaurant service hierarchies and identifies major disruptions including changes in industry classification, increased distance between providers and customers, and potential service quality impacts. The work outlines both opportunities and challenges from these technological shifts.
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The effect of network structure on radical innovation in living labs
Living labs with a distributed multiplex network structure generate radical innovations, while distributed and centralized structures produce incremental innovations. The study analyzed 24 living labs across four countries and found that radical innovation also depends on the driving actor and strategic objectives. A provider- or utilizer-driven living lab combined with distributed multiplex networks and clear future-oriented goals offers the best conditions for radical innovation.
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Corporate Philanthropy, Research Networks, and Collaborative Innovation
Corporate direct giving to research activities increases innovation output and impact. Firms use philanthropy strategically to build research networks and collaborative partnerships that produce more influential and original innovations. Direct giving proves especially valuable for opaque firms and in competitive industries, revealing that philanthropy serves as a tool for expanding innovation networks beyond firm boundaries.
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Methodologic Innovation in Creating Clinical Practice Guidelines: Insights From the 2018 Society of Critical Care Medicine Pain, Agitation/Sedation, Delirium, Immobility, and Sleep Disruption Guideline Effort
This paper describes methodological innovations used to develop clinical practice guidelines for critical care patients. The authors involved critical illness survivors throughout the guideline development process, expanded evidence assessment methods, and systematically identified evidence gaps. Their approach combined expert panels, patient perspectives, qualitative analysis, and structured voting to create recommendations that reflect both clinical evidence and patient values.
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Differential Innovativeness Outcomes of User and Employee Participation in an Online User Innovation Community
This study examines how employees and external users contribute differently to online innovation communities. Using data from Salesforce's IdeaExchange platform, the researchers found that employees who access diverse, well-documented user ideas generate and promote more ideas themselves. Critically, ideas contributed by employees get implemented at higher rates than those from external users alone, suggesting employees play a vital but underexamined role in converting community input into actual innovation.
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Open innovation search in manufacturing firms: the role of organizational slack and absorptive capacity
This study examines how organizational slack influences manufacturing firms' openness to external innovation search. Using ten years of data from 298 U.S. manufacturers, the researchers found that absorbed slack discourages open innovation search, while unabsorbed slack encourages it. Absorptive capacity moderates this relationship, reducing the negative effect of absorbed slack. The findings apply across both high-tech and low-tech firms of varying sizes.
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Iron Deficiency in Cyanobacteria Causes Monomerization of Photosystem I Trimers and Reduces the Capacity for State Transitions and the Effective Absorption Cross Section of Photosystem I in Vivo
Iron deficiency in cyanobacteria triggers production of CP43' protein, which forms rings around photosystem I. Contrary to laboratory predictions, this does not increase PSI's light absorption capacity in living cells. Instead, iron stress causes PSI trimers to break apart into monomers, reduces the cell's ability to balance energy between photosystems, and lowers levels of key electron transport proteins. CP43' functions primarily as a protective mechanism against photodamage rather than enhancing light capture.
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Is There a Doctor in the House? Expert Product Users, Organizational Roles, and Innovation
Surgeon-inventors and board members strengthen innovation in surgical instrument startups, but surgeon-executives often block it. The study of 231 ventures over 25 years shows expert users excel at generating diverse solutions but struggle with selecting the right ones for organizational strategy. Expertise backfires when organizational roles mismatch with expert capabilities, revealing how external dependencies shape young firm innovation.
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What are the most promising conduits for foreign knowledge inflows? innovation networks in the Chinese pharmaceutical industry
This study examines how Chinese pharmaceutical companies access foreign knowledge through innovation networks. The research finds that while multinational enterprises facilitate some knowledge transfer, research institutions like universities and research centers from advanced economies play a more critical role. Individual researchers from these institutions create networks that connect China to global knowledge sources more effectively than organizational MNE channels.
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Open science: policy implications for the evolving phenomenon of user-led scientific innovation
Non-scientists increasingly contribute to scientific research through citizen science projects, but legal barriers and access restrictions limit participation. The paper argues that open science policies—including the Reproducible Research Standard that makes publications, code, and data freely accessible—enable broader public engagement in research. Open dissemination models are reshaping how scientists share work and collaborate, blurring traditional distinctions between professional and lay contributors and requiring new approaches to peer review and recognition.
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State Building through Reputation Building: Coalitions of Esteem and Program Innovation in the National Postal System, 1883–1913
The Post Office Department shaped American state development from 1883 to 1913 by building institutional reputation through coalitions of support. As the largest employer in peacetime America, the POD extended federal reach across the nation, enabling newspaper distribution and political communication. The department drove administrative reform by addressing patronage, corruption, and monopolies while expanding services including banking, roads, air transport, and telegraph management.
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The Unexplored Contribution of Responsible Innovation in Health to Sustainable Development Goals
Responsible Innovation in Health represents an emerging approach that addresses multiple Sustainable Development Goals beyond health alone. The study identified 105 health innovations, mostly from non-profits and universities, with 47% originating in the United States and targeting Africa, Central/South America, and South Asia. These innovations addressed newborn care, mobility issues, infectious diseases, and healthcare access. Most aligned with goals on reducing inequalities and partnerships, while fewer addressed economic development or environmental sustainability. The innovations combined entrepreneurship with social impact to tackle health determinants.
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Is disruption theory wearing new clothes or just naked? Analyzing recent critiques of disruptive innovation theory
This paper examines Jill Lepore's critique of Clayton Christensen's disruptive innovation theory. The author identifies three root causes underlying Lepore's criticisms: the theory lacks a precise definition of disruption, fails to maintain consistent units of analysis, and inadequately accounts for managerial agency. The paper proposes solutions to address these methodological problems and suggests how future research on disruptive innovation can advance.
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External knowledge acquisition and innovation: the role of supply chain network-oriented flexibility and organisational awareness
This study examines how companies acquire external knowledge and convert it into product innovation through flexible supply chain networks. The research finds that supply chain flexibility and information sharing structures mediate the relationship between external knowledge and innovation capability. Organizational awareness—employees' understanding and knowledge—strengthens firms' ability to leverage external knowledge and supply chain capabilities to improve product innovation and overall performance.
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Diffusion of Surgical Innovations, Patient Safety, and Minimally Invasive Radical Prostatectomy
Minimally invasive radical prostatectomy using the da Vinci robot spread rapidly across U.S. hospitals starting in 2006, but early adoption was associated with worse patient safety outcomes compared to open surgery. Patients undergoing the new procedure in 2005–2007 faced double the risk of safety incidents. The study shows that surgical innovations diffuse without adequate safeguards, exposing patients to harm during the learning phase.
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Innovation in disruptive regulatory environments
This paper examines how regulatory environments shape innovation in the automotive industry, focusing on electric vehicle development in response to US zero-emission standards. The authors analyze patent data and case evidence to show that disruptive innovations require market protection to succeed, and that regulations demanding radical technological change face significant implementation barriers. The paper presents a framework linking regulatory types to the technological capabilities they require.
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Framework to study the social innovation networks
This paper develops a framework for studying how social networks influence economic innovation within organizations. The authors clarify what economic innovation means, identify key questions for researching innovation processes, and propose methods for collecting data about innovations. They argue that understanding innovation requires combining social and psychological factors with organizational material aspects, offering a holistic approach to studying how innovations actually develop.
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Policy Innovation Adoption Across the Diffusion Life Course
This study analyzes 566 policies adopted between 1960 and 2016 to understand how states adopt policy innovations across different stages of the diffusion process. The research finds that adoption drivers shift over time: neighboring state adoptions influence early adopters, while ideological learning consistently matters throughout. Less professionalized states adopt later, and wealthier, larger states increasingly drive adoption as policies spread. The findings reveal that predictors of policy adoption vary significantly across the diffusion life course.
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Innovation in the Green Economy: An Extension of the Regional Innovation System Model?
Green innovation in California varies significantly by sector and doesn't automatically drive growth. Environmentally pressured firms innovate processes most, while new green companies target local markets. Traditional firms benefit from innovation, but emerging green firms need local network support and additional resources to commercialize new products and reach markets.
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Forms of host‐country national learning for enhanced MNC absorptive capacity
This study identifies twelve forms of learning that host-country nationals in multinational corporation subsidiaries need to improve knowledge absorption and transfer. Through interviews with managers across three organizational levels, the researchers found that effective learning areas include language skills, cross-cultural awareness, technical management, and understanding MNC strategy and culture. These learning forms enhance the corporation's ability to generate and distribute knowledge globally.
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The Novelty of Innovation: Competition, Disruption, and Antitrust Policy
This paper develops a model showing that new entrants pursue more novel innovations than incumbents, but are less likely to disrupt established firms. When incumbents can acquire entrants after innovation, the threat of acquisition reduces innovation novelty because entrants optimize for acquisition value rather than bold innovation. The findings suggest strict antitrust enforcement encourages entrepreneurial firms to innovate more boldly.
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Teacher education and the GERM: policy entrepreneurship, disruptive innovation and the rhetorics of reform
This paper analyzes how the Institute for Teaching in England, influenced by global education reform movements, rhetorically constructs teacher education as a failing system and positions itself as a disruptive innovator offering practice-based solutions. The authors examine the organization's policy entrepreneurship and neo-liberal framing, concluding that despite sophisticated presentation, its arguments rely on fallacies rather than sound reasoning about complex educational problems.
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Absorptive Capacity in R&D Project Teams: A Conceptualization and Empirical Test
This study develops and tests a multidimensional model of absorptive capacity in R&D project teams using data from 100 innovations. The research finds that teams' ability to evaluate external knowledge directly supports their capacity to assimilate it. Both individual and collective assimilation—particularly reaching shared understanding—matter for applying external knowledge. Prior knowledge reduces the benefit of individual assimilation, while team autonomy strengthens it. The findings clarify how different dimensions of absorptive capacity operate at individual and collective levels.
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Superstar Cities and Left-Behind Places: Disruptive Innovation, Labor Demand, and Interregional Inequality
The paper explains why economic inequality between U.S. regions increased after 1980, reversing decades of convergence. The authors argue that disruptive technologies concentrate demand for skilled workers in certain places initially, then eventually spread that demand elsewhere. Labor supply follows these shifts, creating cycles of regional concentration and dispersal. This theory accounts for observed patterns of rising and falling interregional inequality over time.
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The Anchor Tenant Hypothesis: Exploring the Role of Large, Local, R&D-Intensive Firms in Regional Innovation Systems
Large, R&D-intensive firms acting as anchor tenants strengthen regional innovation systems by improving how local universities' research translates into commercial innovation. The authors examined three technology areas and found that regions with such anchor firms convert academic research into local industrial R&D more effectively than regions without them, despite similar university research presence across regions.
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The Effect of New Product Radicality and Scope on the Extent and Speed of Innovation Diffusion
This study examines how two characteristics of new products—radicality and scope—influence how widely and quickly innovations spread across markets. Using data from 82 product innovations across three industries over sixteen years, the research finds that more radical innovations achieve broader adoption and spread faster, while broader-scope innovations spread faster. The findings apply institutional and bandwagon theories to explain why specific product features drive diffusion rates.
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Web Mash-ups and Patchwork Prototyping: User-driven technological innovation with Web 2.0 and Open Source Software
Users and non-programmers are driving technological innovation by combining open-source software components and web APIs to create functional prototypes and solutions. This mashup approach applies traditional software development techniques in novel ways, enabling creative problem-solving by people without formal programming expertise and reshaping how technology gets designed and produced.
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Innovation and heterogeneous knowledge in managerial contact networks
Managers innovate more effectively when they interact with colleagues who possess diverse knowledge, but only when their local networks are sparse. The study of 106 high-tech managers shows that knowledge diversity alone doesn't guarantee innovation—managers need both exposure to heterogeneous knowledge and enough local autonomy to synthesize new ideas. Sparse networks provide the independence required to develop and implement innovations.
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Start-up collaboration units as knowledge brokers in Corporate Innovation Ecosystems: A study in the automotive industry
Start-up collaboration units within large automotive companies act as knowledge brokers between established firms and startups. The study identifies key barriers to knowledge exchange—including mismatched interpretations and conflicting expectations—and reveals six strategies SCUs use to improve collaboration: building networks, integrating communication, eliciting knowledge, orchestrating dialogue, encouraging creative thinking, and increasing organizational agility.
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From the Dark Side of Industry 4.0 to Society 5.0: Looking “Beyond the Box” to Developing Human-Centric Innovation Ecosystems
The paper argues that Industry 4.0's purely technology-focused approach has created problems, and proposes moving toward Society 5.0, which balances technology with human needs, sustainability, and resilience. Using the Quintuple Helix Model, the authors provide a framework showing how government, universities, industry, civil society, and the environment can work together to build innovation ecosystems that serve both business and society while addressing pandemic and climate challenges.
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Dual Networking: How Collaborators Network in Their Quest for Innovation
Organizations divide innovation work between specialist and generalist roles. This study finds that collaborating pairs perform better when they network within the same groups but connect to different individuals, rather than splitting into entirely separate networks. This dual networking approach enables partners to interpret information from multiple angles, influence stakeholders more effectively, and champion ideas more successfully than pure divide-and-conquer strategies.
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Global drug diffusion and innovation with the medicines patent pool
The Medicines Patent Pool, a joint licensing platform for patented drugs, significantly increases generic drug supply in developing countries, especially those with stronger patent protection. The pool enables generic firms worldwide to license drug bundles affordably for sales in designated developing nations. Analysis of licensing contracts, procurement data, clinical trials, and drug approvals shows the pool also generates modest increases in clinical trials and new drug approvals, primarily from non-pool firms.
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Emerging Lessons From Regional and State Innovation in Value‐Based Payment Reform: Balancing Collaboration and Disruptive Innovation
Value-based payment reform projects across six U.S. states succeeded when multistakeholder coalitions had trusted leadership, external funding, and supportive regulatory environments. Key barriers included incompatible information systems, competing stakeholder priorities, and misalignment between payment models and care delivery. Successful reform required an honest broker to convene stakeholders, change management expertise, and community health infrastructure alongside pressure from payers and providers.
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The role of absorptive capacity and big data analytics in strategic purchasing and supply chain management decisions
Big data analytics adoption in purchasing and supply chain management remains slow despite widespread use elsewhere. A survey of 222 supply chain managers found that a company's absorptive capacity—its ability to explore, assimilate, and transform information—determines whether big data analytics improves strategic decision-making. Only well-resourced companies fully benefit; applying analytics to routine operational tasks yields limited gains.
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Network Embeddedness and Innovation: Evidence From the Alternative Energy Field
This study examines how network embeddedness affects innovation outcomes in a large U.S. energy company. Using 16 years of patent data from 1,561 inventors, the researchers find that relational and structural embeddedness both strengthen exploitative innovation but show inverted U-shaped relationships with exploratory innovation. The overall network structure matters significantly. The findings suggest innovators should adjust their network embeddedness levels strategically depending on the type of innovation they pursue.
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Advancing the practice of online psychotherapy: An application of Rogers' diffusion of innovations theory.
This paper applies Rogers' diffusion of innovations theory to understand why psychologists adopt or reject online therapy. The authors identify nine barriers to adoption, including concerns about dehumanizing therapy, startup costs, licensing issues, ethical guidelines, and professional reputation. They propose theory-based strategies to accelerate adoption of online therapy among clinical psychologists.
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Toward A Theory on the Reproduction of Social Innovations in Subsistence Marketplaces
Social innovations often fail to spread in subsistence contexts despite their potential to address poverty. This paper develops a theory explaining how social innovations get reproduced in sub-Saharan Africa by examining what innovation attributes and actor capacities enable duplication. The authors identify three reproduction archetypes—mimetic, facilitated, and complex—based on the resource and knowledge requirements of innovations versus the capabilities of subsistence users and intermediaries. The framework reveals when users can independently reproduce innovations, when they need external support, and when innovations exceed local capacity.
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The use of social network analysis in innovation studies: Mapping actors and technologies
Social network analysis remains underused in innovation policy and management. This paper identifies three research themes where SNA creates value: collaboration networks, communication networks, and technology networks. The authors examine how applying SNA to these themes generates insights for policy development and organizational management, and outline directions for future research.
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The influence of persuasion, training and experience on user perceptions and acceptance of IT innovation
User adoption of IT innovations depends on beliefs and attitudes shaped by three key factors: persuasion, training, and direct experience. A longitudinal study found that persuasion strongly influences initial perceptions and adoption intentions, training helps users develop realistic expectations, and hands-on experience substantially changes perceptions and adoption decisions over time. Organizations should strategically manage these three factors to improve IT adoption.
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Accelerating Innovation that Enhances Resource Recovery in the Wastewater Sector: Advancing a National Testbed Network
The paper proposes creating a national testbed network to accelerate innovation in wastewater treatment and resource recovery. This virtual network connects physical testing facilities, researchers, investors, technology providers, utilities, and regulators to speed adoption of new technologies and processes. The authors identify key challenges and opportunities for building sustainable water infrastructure through coordinated innovation efforts.
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Disruptive Innovation: Implementation of Electronic Consultations in a Veterans Affairs Health Care System
A Veterans Affairs health system implemented electronic consultations enabling clinicians to request specialist input through the electronic health record without requiring patient visits. Between 2012 and 2013, over 7,000 e-consults were used, with nurse practitioners requesting them more frequently than physicians. Beyond initial diagnostic purposes, clinicians creatively adapted e-consults for scheduling and documentation. Requesting providers found the system highly useful, though specialists worried about workload increases.
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The democratizing effects of frugal innovation
Frugal innovation in livelihood, education, infrastructure, and distribution networks strengthens democratization and state-building in countries with large base-of-pyramid populations. The paper argues that creating inclusive markets through low-cost innovations drives socio-economic development, which reinforces democratic institutions and government capacity. Multinational corporations can advance democratization by profitably serving poor populations.
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The role of relative absorptive capacity in improving suppliers' operational performance
This study examines how suppliers' absorptive capacity affects their operational performance in customer-supplier relationships. Using data from 218 Canadian manufacturers, the researchers found that knowledge-sharing routines between customers and suppliers drive knowledge transfer, which then improves supplier performance. Surprisingly, overlapping knowledge bases did not significantly influence knowledge transfer, suggesting the mechanism works differently than expected.
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Networks, Propinquity, and Innovation in Knowledge-intensive Industries
Geographic proximity and network position jointly influence innovation in biotechnology firms. The study analyzed U.S. life science patents from 1988–1999 and found that regional clustering and network centrality have complementary but interdependent effects on patenting. Firms benefit from local connections to other biotech companies and universities, but this advantage depends on their global network ties. Regional agglomeration shapes how information flows through networks and determines the innovation impact of network centrality.
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Organizational Learning, Diffusion of Innovation, and International Collaboration in Telemedicine
This paper examines how telemedicine practices spread across organizations and what organizations learn from adopting telemedicine. The authors identify competing forces that influence this diffusion process and propose five sets of propositions explaining how telemedicine collaboration generates learning effects and shapes institutional development. The work addresses implications for building telemedicine networks.
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The Evolving University: Disruptive Change and Institutional Innovation
Universities face mounting pressure to drive social and cultural advancement while adapting their core mission. The paper argues that higher education institutions must experiment with inclusive delivery modes, validate new curriculum approaches, develop platforms with relevant applications, and create analytical tools using broad datasets. Future universities will require fundamentally different institutional arrangements and new collaborative methods for presenting specialized knowledge.
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Exploring the Research Regarding Frugal Innovation and Business Sustainability through Bibliometric Analysis
This bibliometric analysis examines 2,072 scientific documents on frugal innovation and business sustainability using Web of Science data and science mapping software. The research identifies growing international interest in how frugal innovation contributes to sustainable business practices and consumer behavior. The USA, Germany, England, the Netherlands, and India lead research activity, with European scholars most prominent. The analysis maps the field's intellectual structure, highlights key journals and authors, and identifies emerging research directions.
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On the geography of emerging industry technological networks: the breadth and depth of patented innovations
This study maps the global wind turbine industry's patent network to show how geographic locations contribute to technological innovation. The research reveals that locations cluster around core technologies like electricity and aerodynamics, with their patent activities determining their importance to the industry. The analysis demonstrates how existing knowledge at a location influences its position in the global network and how new entrants gain central roles in the industry's innovation ecosystem.
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Moocs: Disruptive Innovation and the Future of Higher Education
Massive Open Online Courses (MOOCs) exemplify disruptive innovation in higher education. The paper traces MOOC origins and explains their rapid growth in digital education. While MOOCs may not persist in current forms, examining the problems they address reveals forces reshaping higher education and offers educators opportunities to actively influence the field's future direction.
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Competing pressures of risk and absorptive capacity potential on commitment and information sharing in global supply chains
Organizations participating in global supply chains face competing pressures when deciding whether to commit to and share information with partners. This study surveyed 207 organizations about their offshore outsourcing relationships and found that perceived business risk from supply chain partners strongly reduces commitment and information sharing, while partners' absorptive capacity strongly increases both. Commitment acts as a partial mediator between these factors and information sharing. Geographic and cultural location had no significant effect on these relationships.
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The Development and Diffusion of Radical Technological Innovation: The Role of Bus Demonstration Projects in Commercializing Fuel Cell Technology
Governments in North America, Europe, and Japan have funded demonstration projects to commercialize fuel cell bus technology as part of climate change strategies. This paper examines how various stakeholders—government agencies, automotive developers, and industry players—interact through these projects. The authors find that demonstration projects play a crucial role in technology adoption, but conflicting objectives among industry participants and complex government-developer relationships significantly hinder progress toward widespread commercialization.
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The Internationalization of SMES in Emerging Economies: Institional Embeddedness and Absorptive Capacities
Small and medium-sized enterprises in emerging economies pursue internationalization through different strategies based on their type. Incumbent SMEs leverage embedded networks with local governments and business groups to expand internationally. Entrepreneurial startups develop capabilities by learning from foreign firms and continuously identifying new opportunities in foreign markets. Both approaches enable SMEs to build knowledge and compete successfully in international markets.
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Development of a method for determining oil absorption capacity in pulse flours and protein materials
Researchers developed an improved laboratory method for measuring oil absorption capacity in pulse and soybean flours and protein products. The new method addresses problems with conventional testing by using a lower sample-to-oil ratio, reduced centrifugal force, and a filter paper apparatus to prevent material loss. The simplified procedure produces reliable, reproducible results and enables faster testing of multiple samples while accurately distinguishing between different pulse and soybean ingredients.
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Improving Green Market Orientation, Green Supply Chain Relationship Quality, and Green Absorptive Capacity to Enhance Green Competitive Advantage in the Green Supply Chain
This study examines how green market orientation, supply chain relationship quality, and absorptive capacity drive competitive advantage in green supply chains. The research finds that green market orientation significantly influences competitive advantage, but this effect operates entirely through supply chain relationship quality and absorptive capacity as mediators. Employee culture emphasizing environmental responsibility emerges as a critical driver of competitive success in green supply chains.
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The Global Research-and-Development Network and Its Effect on Innovation
This study examines how pharmaceutical firms' position in global research-and-development networks affects innovation impact. The research finds that a firm's scientific knowledge intensity enhances innovation when combined with strong network resources. International gatekeepers bridging U.S., Japanese, and European firms strengthen this relationship. The study demonstrates that innovation succeeds when internal research capability and external network connections work together.
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Examining the Diffusion of Innovations from a Dynamic, Differential-Effects Perspective: A Longitudinal Study on AI Adoption Among Employees
This study tracks how employees adopt AI in workplaces over time, finding that job security concerns drive increasingly negative attitudes toward AI. Relative advantage, compatibility, and observability strengthen positive attitudes, while ease of use and trialability have no significant effect. The impact of these factors varies by group: trialability only helps those already positive about AI, while observability and threat concerns matter more to skeptics.
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The dynamic contribution of innovation ecosystems to schumpeterian firms: A multi-level analysis
This study examines how proximity to innovation ecosystem agents affects Schumpeterian firms' innovation performance. Using firm-level data from 2002–2014 covering 3,074 observations, the authors apply knowledge spillover theory to show that geographical closeness to ecosystem agents drives innovation outcomes. The research clarifies how firm size moderates these effects and identifies specific mechanisms through which knowledge spillovers enhance firm performance.
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Planning, Land and Housing in the Digital Data Revolution/The Politics of Digital Transformations of Housing/Digital Innovations, PropTech and Housing – the View from Melbourne/Digital Housing and Renters: Disrupting the Australian Rental Bond System and Tenant Advocacy/Prospects for an Intelligent Planning System/What are the Prospects for a Politically Intelligent Planning System?
Digital planning systems promise to predict urban development outcomes, but housing data gaps systematically undercount vulnerable populations. The author's research in Portland, Oregon reveals that despite regional modeling capacity, comprehensive rental housing data remains unavailable due to political and market barriers, not technical limitations. This prevents planners from accurately forecasting displacement risks when transit investments reshape neighborhoods.
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Measuring the diffusion of an innovation: A citation analysis
This paper develops a method for tracking how innovations spread across research fields using citation analysis and topic modeling. The authors identify five stages of innovation diffusion: testing, implementation, improvement, extending, and fading. They demonstrate that when innovations like Latent Dirichlet Allocation move between research areas, adoption patterns cluster among fields with similar interests, revealing how interdisciplinary knowledge transfer actually occurs.
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Innovations and stepwise evolution of CBFs/DREB1s and their regulatory networks in angiosperms
This paper traces the evolutionary origin of CBF/DREB1 genes, which regulate cold tolerance in flowering plants. The researchers found that CBF/DREB1 evolved from tandem duplication of an ancestral DREB III gene, then split into two clades through whole genome duplication. Only one clade developed cold sensitivity. Gene duplications accelerated during the Cretaceous-Paleogene boundary and Ice Age, when global temperatures dropped. These duplications rewired regulatory networks that enabled plants to survive colder climates.
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Global buyer–supplier networks and innovation: The role of technological distance and technological breadth
Firms that source from global suppliers with diverse technological capabilities innovate more effectively, but only when technological distance between buyer and supplier remains manageable. The study analyzes 246 firms and their supplier networks, finding that broad supplier knowledge boosts innovation while excessive technological gaps hinder it. Global sourcing itself improves innovation, though this benefit diminishes when suppliers operate in distant technological domains.
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Determinants of Service Innovation in Academic Libraries through the Lens of Disruptive Innovation
Academic libraries face disruption from digital technologies and must innovate their services to remain relevant. The paper applies the Resources-Processes-Values framework to recommend that library administrators lead innovation efforts, build supportive cultures, reward innovation, create autonomous innovation teams, and partner with users and other institutions to develop new services that respond to technological change.
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Millennials and the adoption of new technologies in libraries through the diffusion of innovations process
Millennials drive technology adoption in libraries by acting as change agents and early adopters. While libraries suggest new technologies as solutions to problems, adoption lags behind other sectors. Millennials use specific communication channels to shift employee attitudes toward new tools. Understanding technology adoption through diffusion theory rather than focusing on individual tools helps explain the broader paradigm shift in how libraries embrace innovation.
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RFID as a Disruptive Innovation
This paper analyzes RFID technology adoption through innovation theory, using Walmart's supply chain implementation as a case study. The authors argue that while Walmart treated RFID as an incremental improvement, the technology actually has disruptive potential across business and society. They propose two frameworks—object-oriented and visionary approaches—to help researchers and practitioners recognize and develop RFID's transformative applications beyond current narrow implementations.
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Absorptive capacity and interpretation system's impact when ‘going green’: an empirical study of ford, volvo cars and toyota
Three automotive companies—Ford, Volvo, and Toyota—developed greener cars with lower fuel consumption. The study found that companies with an 'enacting' approach to environmental interpretation, actively shaping market demand, succeeded better than those with a 'discovering' approach that passively responded to existing demand. Companies using discovery mode needed to combine engineering expertise with consumer psychology insights to profitably market environmental benefits.
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Investigation of the energy absorption capacity of foam-filled 3D-printed glass fiber reinforced thermoplastic auxetic honeycomb structures
This paper examines how foam-filled 3D-printed glass fiber reinforced auxetic honeycomb structures absorb energy under compression. Researchers tested both hollow and foam-filled lattice structures, finding that foam increased energy absorption by 20% for PLA and 70% for PA materials. They validated results through finite element analysis and developed a theoretical model to predict failure behavior, showing that adjusting strut angles affects both load capacity and the structure's auxetic properties.
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Responsible innovation with digital platforms: Cases in India and Canada
This study examines two digital platforms in India and Canada that serve marginalized communities by addressing grand challenges like education, healthcare, and livelihood access. The platforms orchestrate ecosystems involving marginalized individuals, government agencies, and other entities to deliver physical, digital, and societal solutions. The research demonstrates how responsible innovation principles—anticipation, reflexivity, inclusion, and responsiveness—operate through digital platforms to generate simultaneous economic and social value for vulnerable populations.
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Modified 2016 American College of Rheumatology Fibromyalgia Criteria, the Analgesic, Anesthetic, and Addiction Clinical Trial Translations Innovations Opportunities and Networks–American Pain Society Pain Taxonomy, and the Prevalence of Fibromyalgia
This paper is not about rural innovation. It reports on fibromyalgia prevalence in the German general population using two diagnostic criteria sets, finding that AAPT criteria identify 73% more cases than the 2016 ACR criteria, though with lower symptom severity. The study compares diagnostic accuracy and clinical characteristics between the two approaches.
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Technological Frames and User Innovation
Online community moderators on Reddit who migrated to Discord faced scaling and design challenges. They responded by creating custom scripts and bots using Discord's API to modify the platform and replicate Reddit's functionality. End-user programming enabled these communities to innovate solutions to unanticipated design problems, transforming new platforms to match their existing expectations and workflows.
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Global Lessons In Frugal Innovation To Improve Health Care Delivery In The United States
This study identifies five successful low-cost healthcare innovations from global contexts and examines how they could improve US healthcare delivery. The researchers find common themes across these frugal innovations and outline critical factors for adapting them to American settings. They highlight existing US trends—shifting care to community settings, alternative payment models, and expanded use of community health workers—that create opportunities for implementing these globally-sourced innovations.
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Generating Democratic Legitimacy through Deliberative Innovations: The Role of Embeddedness and Disruptiveness
Deliberative innovations—structured public participation events—can strengthen democratic legitimacy only when properly embedded in existing institutions. This study compares four deliberative events across Europe and Canada, finding that institutional integration significantly affects legitimacy outcomes, while a deliberative process's disruptive potential has no bearing on its legitimacy claims.
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Absorptive capacity and network orchestration in innovation communities – promoting service innovation
Service innovation increasingly happens in loosely coupled networks called innovation communities. This paper shows that orchestrating these communities requires discrete guidance tailored to services' unique characteristics. The research identifies how orchestration mechanisms and contingency factors together build absorptive capacity—the network's ability to recognize, assimilate, and apply new knowledge—enabling service innovation. Managing networks demands rethinking traditional innovation management approaches.
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Internet computing as a disruptive information technology innovation: the role of strong order effects1
A survey of 121 software firms reveals how companies adopt internet computing innovations in a specific sequence: base innovations first, then service innovations, then process innovations. The study shows that the amount and radicalness of base innovations directly drive service innovations, which then influence process innovations. Software organizations should recognize that radical innovations are interconnected and adopt flexible strategies that account for these dependencies.
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The Mediating Effect of Absorptive Capacity and Relational Capital in Alliance Learning of SMEs
Small businesses need partnerships with complementary resources to grow. This study examines how learning intent, absorptive capacity, and relational capital work together to shape what innovative SMEs learn through business alliances. The research shows how these factors interact to influence both technological and non-technological learning outcomes in collaborative relationships.
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Responsible research and innovation: a productive model for the future of medical innovation
This paper examines how responsible research and innovation (RRI) applies to healthcare by conducting focus groups in Montreal with patients, clinicians, engineers, designers, and innovation managers. The researchers use these discussions about technological solutions to healthcare challenges to develop a more detailed understanding of RRI's four dimensions: anticipation, reflexivity, inclusion, and responsiveness. The work shows how responsibility in medical innovation requires balancing perspectives across different stakeholder groups.
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Explorative Versus Exploitative Business Model Change: The Cognitive Antecedents of Firm‐Level Responses to Disruptive Innovation
Incumbent firms respond to disruptive business model innovations through two strategies: exploring new disruptive models or exploiting existing ones. The study identifies cognitive drivers of each approach. Opportunity perception and perceived threats drive explorative adoption, while critical threats and industry tenure discourage it. Risk experience increases both strategies. These findings reveal how managers' perceptions shape strategic responses to disruption.
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If It Takes a Village to Foster Innovation, Success Depends on the Neighbors: The Effects of Global and Ego Networks on New Product Launches
This study examines how a firm's position within industry networks affects new product launches. Using alliance data from consumer packaged goods companies between 1990 and 2010, the researchers found that central network positions boost incremental product launches but harm breakthrough innovations. However, firms with dense, diverse direct partnerships and strong R&D capabilities can overcome this trade-off, using their network position to improve incremental products while protecting breakthrough innovations.
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From<scp>TV</scp>Personality to Fans and Beyond: Indexical Bleaching and the Diffusion of a Media Innovation
This paper examines how a media phrase popularized by a television personality spreads beyond its original audience. The phrase 'lady pond' circulates from Bravo viewers to broader Twitter users while maintaining its form and meaning. However, it loses its connection to its media source through a process called indexical bleaching, where the phrase becomes detached from its original context, enabling wider adoption and diffusion.
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Anchor tenants and regional innovation systems: the aircraft industry
Large innovative firms, universities, and research institutions act as anchor tenants that generate knowledge spillovers in their regions, spurring new company formation and attracting additional businesses. These anchor tenants drive regional innovation system development, but their emergence depends on pre-existing favorable conditions specific to each industry. The paper uses the aircraft industry to demonstrate how anchor dynamics shape regional economic evolution.
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A diffusion of innovations model of physician order entry.
This study applies diffusion of innovations theory to understand physician order entry (POE) adoption in hospitals. Researchers conducted qualitative analysis across multiple hospital sites, identifying four key theme areas: organizational issues, clinical and professional concerns, technology implementation challenges, and information organization problems. The findings show POE is a complex innovation requiring customizable, integrated systems with strong user involvement, organizational support, and collaborative trust to succeed.
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Evaluation of Farm Fresh Food Boxes: A Hybrid Alternative Food Network Market Innovation
Researchers evaluated Farm Fresh Food Boxes, a market innovation combining CSA-style produce with rural retail distribution across Vermont, Washington, and California. The model expanded farmer markets and improved rural food access, though profits remained modest. Consumers valued the fresh local produce and convenience, while farmers and retailers appreciated brand development and customer base expansion despite added labor demands. The innovation addressed rural food deserts and supply chain vulnerabilities.
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Towards an alignment of activities, aspirations and stakeholders for responsible innovation
This paper addresses how to govern technological innovation responsibly by proposing a framework that aligns innovation activities, stakeholder aspirations, and governance dimensions. The authors integrate sustainability principles with responsible innovation concepts—anticipation, reflexivity, inclusion, and responsiveness—to answer how innovation should proceed responsibly. A nanotechnology case study demonstrates the framework's practical application for government agencies, industry, and stakeholders managing innovation governance.
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Canadian Science, Technology and Innovation Policy: The Product of Regional Networking?
Canadian science, technology, and innovation policy operates through regional networks despite federal funding and policy formulation. The federal government deliberately structures STI programmes to promote network creation across provinces and regions, emphasizing economic development and industrial cluster formation. This networked approach effectively regionalizes policy implementation across Canada's federal system.
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The Imperative of Responsible Innovation in Reproductive Medicine
This article examines the lack of evidence supporting widespread use of preimplantation genetic testing for aneuploidy in reproductive medicine. The authors use this case to highlight a broader problem: reproductive medicine adopts new technologies without sufficient data demonstrating their safety and effectiveness. They argue for more responsible innovation practices that require robust evidence before clinical implementation.
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Genotype network intersections promote evolutionary innovation
This paper investigates how evolutionary innovations emerge by studying genotype networks—the sets of genetic variants producing identical traits. Using high-throughput sequencing of catalytic RNA molecules, researchers found that innovations occur where two different genotype networks overlap. Multiple genetic sequences can perform both functions at these intersections. Neutral evolution periods allow populations to explore genotype networks more broadly, accelerating adaptation to new functions. The findings suggest natural evolutionary innovations may arise through overlapping genetic networks.
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New Concepts for New Dynamics: Generating Theory for the Study of Religious Innovation and Social Change
The Emerging Church movement demonstrates how religious innovation occurs through institutional entrepreneurship. Emerging Christians deconstruct and reframe mainstream Christian beliefs and practices while creating new organizational forms to legitimize their alternative approaches. This collective innovation operates through diffuse networks across geographic spaces and social groups, showing how religious change emerges not from isolated individuals but through coordinated action responding to broader societal conditions.
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Twitter as Disruptive Innovation in Sport Communication
This paper argues that Twitter functions as a disruptive innovation in sport communication by shifting from traditional one-to-many television consumption to many-to-many participatory models. Users themselves defined how the platform would be used for sport engagement. The author calls for comprehensive theoretical analysis of Twitter's role in sport, noting that existing research often applies older media frameworks rather than developing new theory suited to this platform's unique characteristics.
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Knowledge-Intensive Business Services (KIBS) Use and User Innovation: High-Order Services, Geographic Hierarchies and Internet Use in Quebec's Manufacturing Sector
Geographic proximity to knowledge-intensive business services (KIBS) does not improve innovation performance in Quebec's manufacturing sector. Firms seeking innovation-related services travel farther to access specialized KIBS suppliers located in central urban areas, regardless of distance. Innovators actively seek out the best service providers rather than relying on nearby options, creating a geographic hierarchy where innovation-focused KIBS concentrate in major centers.
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Absorptive Capacity at the Individual Level: Linking Creativity to Innovation in Academia
This paper applies absorptive capacity theory to individual academics, showing how creativity and innovation connect at the personal level. The authors develop a framework predicting research scholarship among university faculty, extending absorptive capacity analysis from organizational and country levels down to individual performance in academic settings.
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Decentralized clinical trials in the trial innovation network: Value, strategies, and lessons learned
The Trial Innovation Network evaluated decentralized clinical trial approaches across over 400 studies, finding that remote tools like electronic consent, social media recruitment, and remote interventions improve efficiency and reduce participation barriers. Some elements work well, while remote recruitment and monitoring need refinement. Hybrid trials combining remote and in-person methods offer promise for increasing urban-rural diversity, though ensuring equitable access to technology and building trust with marginalized communities remain critical challenges.
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Entrepreneurs’ Assessments of Early International Entry: The Role of Foreign Social Ties, Venture Absorptive Capacity, and Generalized Trust in Others
Entrepreneurs' decisions to enter foreign markets depend on their social ties abroad, their venture's ability to absorb new knowledge, and their trust in others. The study analyzed 4,352 international entry assessments from 136 entrepreneurs and found that these three factors interact significantly to shape how entrepreneurs evaluate opportunities for early international expansion.
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National characteristics: innovation systems from the process efficiency perspective
This study analyzes innovation systems across 40 countries by treating them as two-stage processes: knowledge production and commercialization. Using data envelopment analysis, researchers identified efficiency levels and ranked countries by their strengths in each stage. The analysis reveals that no country excels equally at both stages, and categorizes nations into nine distinct groups based on their innovation characteristics. The findings offer policymakers benchmarks for improvement and examples of best practices to learn from.
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A study of innovation diffusion through link sharing on stack overflow
This study examines how software developers discover and adopt innovations like tools and frameworks by analyzing link sharing on Stack Overflow. The researchers find that link sharing occurs frequently on the platform, making Stack Overflow a significant channel for spreading software development innovations. They show Stack Overflow functions as part of a larger network of interconnected online resources that developers use to find and evaluate new tools.
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Creating a Taxonomy for Mobile Commerce Innovations Using Social Network and Cluster Analyses
This paper analyzes over 2,300 mobile commerce patent applications using social network and cluster analysis to identify focal innovation areas and create a taxonomy of m-commerce innovations. The analysis reveals that consumer empowerment and co-creation drive mobile commerce service development, showing how customers shape new offerings in this rapidly growing sector.
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The Role of Organizational Affiliations and Research Networks in the Diffusion of Breast Cancer Treatment Innovation
Patients treated at hospitals affiliated with cancer research networks received innovative breast cancer treatment (sentinel lymph node biopsy) at significantly higher rates than those at unaffiliated hospitals. Hospital teaching status and surgical volume did not affect adoption rates. The findings support using research networks to accelerate translation of medical innovations into community practice.
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Innovations in a relational context: Mechanisms to connect learning processes of absorptive capacity
Companies build competitive advantage through relationships with other firms. This study examines how learning mechanisms within customer-supplier relationships create absorptive capacity and drive innovation. The research identifies that structural mechanisms alone are insufficient; cultural, psychological, and policy mechanisms also shape how firms learn and absorb knowledge across relationships. The findings provide propositions for understanding absorptive capacity development in relational contexts.
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Innovation and Strategy: Risk and Choice in Shaping User-Centered Libraries
Libraries succeed by creating customer-centered services through innovation and strategy. The paper argues that strategy and innovation are essential tools for organizational success, with strategy enabling effective innovation decisions. Library leaders must continuously develop value-added services, strategically evaluate innovations, and deliver them to users. The paper reviews innovation and strategy theories applied to nonprofit library organizations and proposes approaches for creating both.
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Toward a Theory of Activist‐Driven Responsible Innovation: How Activists Pressure Firms to Adopt More Responsible Practices
Activists pressure firms to adopt responsible innovation through strategic use of claims that create pressure beyond simple information sharing. This study examines four activist organizations across six campaigns, developing a theory of how activists drive companies toward socially and environmentally responsible practices. The research shows that activist characteristics and firm features shape whether pressure campaigns succeed in creating socioenvironmental value.
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International handbook on responsible innovation. A global resource
This handbook provides a comprehensive global overview of responsible innovation as a field of study and practice. It synthesizes current knowledge about how innovation can be developed and implemented in ways that consider ethical, social, and environmental impacts across diverse contexts worldwide.
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The Encroachment Speed of Potentially Disruptive Innovations with Indirect Network Externalities: The Case of E‐Readers
This paper examines why e-readers adopted more slowly in Japan than the United States after 2010. Through interviews with industry leaders and document review, the authors identify three sources of slower adoption: organizational factors within publishing companies, technology factors including competing formats, and environmental factors such as regulations limiting e-book supply and pricing. The research shows that publishing industry insiders in Japan misinterpreted earlier e-reader performance and faced constraints from interdependent value networks.
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Disruptive innovation and spatial inequality
Disruptive innovations cluster geographically during industrial revolutions but disperse in other periods, according to analysis of US patents from 1920 to 2010. The locations capturing the most disruptive innovation shift substantially across industrial revolutions. Disruptive innovation significantly influences spatial patterns of economic output and income inequality across US regions.
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Dynamic capabilities for transitioning from product platform ecosystem to innovation platform ecosystem
Incumbent firms face disruption from platform-native competitors and must transition from product platforms to innovation platforms. This study identifies four dynamic capabilities required for this transition: resource curation, ecosystem preservation, resource reconfiguration, and ecosystem diversification. The findings emerge from analyzing perspectives of platform owners, partners, and end-users in enterprise software ecosystems.
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Innovating via building absorptive capacity: Interactive effects of top management support of learning, employee learning orientation and decentralization structure
Manufacturing firms build absorptive capacity and improve innovation through top management support for learning and employee learning orientation. Decentralized decision-making structures strengthen how management support translates into absorptive capacity and innovation, but organizational structure does not similarly affect the relationship between employee learning orientation and innovation outcomes.
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The frequency of end-user innovation: A re-estimation of extant findings
This study re-estimates how often consumers innovate by comparing two data collection methods. Telephone interviews found 10.8% of people innovate, but personal interviews revealed 39.7%—showing previous research significantly underestimated user innovation. Using this correction factor across six countries, the authors demonstrate that consumer innovation is a widespread phenomenon policymakers and businesses should recognize and support.
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Absorptive and desorptive capacity‐related practices at the network level – the case of<scp>SEMATECH</scp>
This paper examines how interorganizational networks absorb and use external knowledge, moving beyond traditional firm-level analysis. Using SEMATECH, a global semiconductor manufacturing consortium, the author identifies three key practices—congregating, roadmapping, and offering access—that enable networks to collectively acquire, integrate, and leverage knowledge from outside sources while coordinating internal knowledge activities.
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Everett Rogers' Diffusion of Innovations Theory: Its Utility and Value in Public Health
Rogers' Diffusion of Innovations theory has evolved from linear communication models to interactive frameworks where participants jointly create understanding of new ideas and practices. The theory has proven valuable across applied fields including international development, family planning, nutrition education, and substance abuse prevention, demonstrating its utility for understanding how innovations spread through populations.
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The adoption and diffusion of interorganizational system standards and process innovations
This paper examines how interorganizational system standards and process innovations spread across industries. The authors surveyed 102 firms across 10 industrial groups to identify what drives adoption of modern IOS technologies like XML and SOAP. They found that technological, organizational, and environmental factors—plus the role of standards development organizations—significantly influence whether companies implement these systems. The research bridges older EDI-focused studies with current web-based interorganizational solutions.
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Radical innovations as supply chain disruptions? A paradox between change and stability
Radical innovations in products and processes create paradoxical tensions in supply chains, particularly between the need for change and the need for stability. The paper uses case illustrations to examine how these tensions emerge upstream after radical innovation and proposes paradox theory as a framework for understanding and managing them. It identifies supply chain management as an underexplored area for paradox research and calls for future studies on post-innovation tensions.
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Digital organizational culture and absorptive capacity as precursors to supply chain resilience and sustainable performance
This study examines how digital organizational culture and absorptive capacity strengthen supply chain resilience and sustainable performance in Mexican manufacturing firms. Using data from 304 companies, the research finds that digital culture directly improves both dynamic capabilities and business performance, while also indirectly boosting sustainability through enhanced absorptive capacity and supply chain resilience. The findings help manufacturers build resilience against disruptions like pandemics.
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An evaluation of the effectiveness of innovation ecosystems in facilitating the adoption of sustainable entrepreneurship
This paper develops a hierarchical decision model framework to assess how innovation ecosystems support sustainable entrepreneurship adoption. The researchers identify policies and strategies that drive innovation across entrepreneurial ecosystems and propose a comprehensive measurement model to guide policymakers in strengthening ecosystem effectiveness and accelerating sustainable business innovation.
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Board interlocks, absorptive capacity, and environmental performance
Firms with diverse board interlocks—connections to multiple companies, across industries, and to top performers—achieve better environmental performance. However, this benefit depends on absorptive capacity: companies must invest in research and development to actually use the knowledge gained through these board connections. The study shows that R&D intensity moderates how effectively board interlocks translate into environmental improvements.
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Relational capital for shared vision in innovation ecosystems
This paper examines relationship networks in three metropolitan innovation ecosystems—Austin, Minneapolis, and Paris—using Triple Helix framework and network analysis. The authors measure relational capital through network metrics and visualizations, revealing distinct patterns that structure business activity at startup, growth, and enterprise levels. They demonstrate that data-driven indicators of relational capital can guide network orchestration, inform policy decisions, and build shared vision across spatially defined business ecosystems.
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Trends in Pancreatic Pathology Practice Before and After Implementation of Endoscopic Ultrasound-Guided Fine-Needle Aspiration: An Example of Disruptive Innovation Effect?
This paper is about medical pathology practice, not rural innovation. It examines how endoscopic ultrasound-guided fine-needle aspiration changed pancreatic disease diagnosis in a hospital laboratory over 20 years, showing the technique improved diagnostic accuracy and reduced the need for tissue biopsies. The work has no connection to rural innovation, agricultural technology, or rural development.
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Responsible research and innovation in information systems
This paper examines responsible research and innovation within information systems, arguing that the field's diverse approaches require careful consideration of ethical and social dimensions in how IS research and innovation are conducted and applied. The work addresses the need for IS scholars to engage with responsibility frameworks that go beyond technical solutions.
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Does Broadband Access Impact Migration in America? Examining Differences between Rural and Urban Areas
Using U.S. county-level data from 2000 to 2006, this study examines whether broadband access affects migration patterns. Broadband had mild effects on migration in urban areas. In rural areas, counties with only one broadband type saw no significant in-migration, but rural counties with both Cable and DSL access experienced significant in-migration compared to counties without broadband.
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Innovation in risk transfer for natural hazards impacting agriculture☆
Agricultural yields face significant risks from natural hazards, price fluctuations, and output variability. This paper examines innovations in risk transfer mechanisms for agriculture, particularly crop insurance. While wealthy nations use established crop insurance programs, these rely on subsidies unsuitable for lower-income countries. Yet lower-income nations with many small farms urgently need affordable agricultural insurance to protect farm households from catastrophic losses.
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THEORETICAL PERSPECTIVES ON DIGITAL DIVIDE AND ICT ACCESS: COMPARATIVE STUDY OF RURAL COMMUNITIES IN AFRICA AND THE UNITED STATES
This comparative review examines why rural communities in Africa and the United States face different barriers to digital technology access. The authors analyze infrastructure gaps, digital literacy levels, and socio-economic factors affecting ICT adoption. They assess how policy environments either hinder or support digital inclusion and identify what reforms and innovations could reduce digital disparities in rural areas.
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Anticipating gender impacts in scaling innovations for agriculture: Insights from the literature
Small farms produce most of the world's food, but innovations often fail to address gender inequalities and may cause harm. This review identifies six critical areas where gender considerations matter when scaling agricultural innovations: team composition, innovation design, communication, business models, technology adaptation, and political economy. The authors recommend practical methods for collecting gender-disaggregated data and call for scaling tools that explicitly address gender and social marginalization.
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Entrepreneurial Talent Building for 21st Century Agricultural Innovation
Agricultural innovation requires developing entrepreneurial farmers—termed 'AgTech Pioneers'—who can participate as cocreators in cross-sector innovation ecosystems. The paper argues that talent development, interdisciplinary training programs, and innovation clusters should support farmer participation in sustainable food system transitions. This approach harnesses technological advances, reinvigorates farming careers, and accelerates application of nanoscience and nanotechnology to address agricultural challenges.
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Innovations in afforestation of agricultural bottomlands to restore native forests in the eastern USA
The paper presents innovations for restoring native forests in former agricultural fields across the eastern USA. Key advances include improved nursery production of larger, healthier seedlings with better root systems, and new silvicultural practices like planting seedlings with cover crops to reduce competition and herbivory. An innovative strategy uses fast-growing poplar trees as nurse crops to establish slower-growing oak species, which are then harvested to release the oaks. These ecosystem-based approaches restore ecological function faster and more affordably than traditional single-species afforestation.
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Capacity, scale and place: pragmatic lessons for doing community‐based research in the rural setting
Community-based research offers a flexible, context-sensitive approach suited to rural areas experiencing rapid economic and social change. Drawing on experience in northern British Columbia, the authors identify practical lessons for conducting community-based research effectively, organizing insights around three key stages: preparing for community engagement, conducting fieldwork, and post-fieldwork activities. They address gaps in methodological guidance and advocate for better training in community-based research methods for rural contexts.
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Educational and health services innovation to improve care for rural Hispanic Communities in the US
A rural health program in South Carolina addressed barriers to care for Hispanic immigrants through an innovative mobile clinic combining culturally competent healthcare delivery with student education. The Accessible and Culturally Competent Health Care Project used nurse practitioners, bilingual interpreters, community health advisors, and university students to provide affordable, accessible care while training future health professionals. The program demonstrates how educational and health service innovation can serve underserved rural populations.
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Geo-Policy Barriers and Rural Internet Access: The Regulatory Role in Constructing the Digital Divide
Geographic isolation and regulatory policies jointly determine rural internet access. A study of 208 Texas telephone exchanges and rural counties shows that market territories and distance requirements under expanded local calling policy both facilitate and obstruct internet service provider presence in remote areas. Policy design significantly shapes the digital divide.
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Examining palliative care program use and place of death in rural and urban contexts: a Canadian population-based study using linked data
This Canadian study examined palliative care program enrollment and place of death across rural and urban Nova Scotia from 2003 to 2009. Women, younger seniors, and cancer patients enrolled most frequently. Distance to palliative care services strongly predicted enrollment and hospital death, but urban-rural residence alone did not. Effects varied significantly by district, suggesting local context and service organization matter more than simple rural-urban categorization for end-of-life care access.
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Legacy sectors: barriers to global innovation in agriculture and energy
The US innovation system contains 'legacy sectors' in agriculture and energy that resist disruptive change through subsidies, entrenched infrastructure, regulatory barriers, powerful vested interests, and established consumer habits. These structural obstacles prevent new technologies from reaching markets, even when socially beneficial. The authors argue that large-scale research investment is needed regardless of competitive costs, and that American paradigms exported globally delay innovation adoption in developing countries that need locally appropriate technologies.
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Learning and Innovation Competence in Agricultural and Rural Development
This paper argues that agricultural and rural development benefit when competence development and capacity development are integrated rather than kept separate. The research finds that measuring learning outcomes—changes in how people think, feel, and act—better develops organizational innovation capacity than traditional input-output metrics. The author concludes that combining theory-based, competence-based, and experiential learning through education and extension strengthens innovation systems in agriculture.
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"Free Seeds, Not Free Beer": Participatory Plant Breeding, OpenSource Seeds, and Acknowledging User Innovation in Agriculture
Intellectual property expansion in plants threatens global food security and agriculture. The paper examines international treaties like the 2001 ITPGR that create limited commons for plant genetic resources. It proposes adapting open-source software licenses to plant breeding, arguing that open-source seed licenses can increase farmer and public breeder access to genetic resources worldwide.
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Do Federal Place-Based Policies Improve Economic Opportunity in Rural Communities?
Federal place-based policies increased substantially in rural counties between 1990 and 2015. The study finds that rural youth who received more place-based funding in their counties achieved higher educational attainment and earnings in adulthood, but only if they migrated away. Place-based investment appears to improve economic opportunity by enabling geographic mobility rather than creating local prosperity.
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Potential Benefits from Innovations to Reduce Heat and Water Stress in Agriculture
Climate change will reduce agricultural productivity in the central United States through two distinct mechanisms: heat stress and water stress. Using econometric analysis of rental rates, the author finds that by mid-century, climate damages will reach $9.5 billion annually, with heat stress causing 65% of losses and water deficit causing 32%. The spatial variation in damage sources suggests that targeted innovations addressing heat or water stress will have different benefits depending on region.
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Community-based broadband organizations and video communications for remote and rural First Nations in Canada
Two First Nations organizations in Canada use broadband video communications—including videoconferences and online videos—to support economic and social development in remote and rural communities. The research analyzes hundreds of archived videos and interviews with key users, situating these organizations within a broader movement toward First Nations self-determination.
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Serving rural low‐income markets through a social entrepreneurship approach: Venture creation and growth
Social entrepreneurs in rural Latin America create and grow ventures serving low-income communities by continuously revising goals and building capabilities, embedding operations deeply in communities, and innovating business models suited to resource-constrained environments. The study of three ventures reveals that success requires treating communities as resource sources, not just customers, and adapting distribution, marketing, and management practices to local conditions.
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The Association of Broadband Internet Access and Telemedicine Utilization in rural Western Tennessee: an observational study
Rural patients in western Tennessee with high broadband access (80-100%) were significantly more likely to use telemedicine than those with low access (0-20%), even after adjusting for income, education, and physician supply. Broadband availability emerged as a key factor enabling telemedicine adoption in rural communities, suggesting that expanding broadband infrastructure directly improves rural healthcare access.
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Does Adoption of Agricultural Innovations Impact Farm Production and Household Welfare in Sub-Saharan Africa? A Meta-Analysis
A meta-analysis of 92 studies from sub-Saharan Africa between 2001 and 2015 finds that adopting agricultural innovations does increase farm production and household welfare, but the effects are modest. The positive impacts exist but remain relatively small, indicating a weaker relationship than might be expected from widespread innovation adoption efforts.
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Innovations and issues in the delivery of continuing education to nurse practitioners in rural and northern communities.
Rural nurse practitioners need continuing education to maintain professional skills, but distance delivery presents challenges. This study tracked Ontario's Rural Nurse Practitioner Continuing Education Initiative through needs assessment, implementation, and evaluation. Practitioners preferred face-to-face learning but faced barriers. The pilot project addressed these constraints using multiple online delivery modes and constructivist teaching methods. Despite innovations, significant challenges remain in serving rural and remote nurse practitioners.
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Review of climate change issues: A forcing function perspective in agricultural and energy innovation
Climate change creates urgent innovation opportunities in agriculture, energy, and food systems. Rising temperatures increase cooling demands and energy stress, while droughts threaten food production despite projected 60% global food demand increases by 2050. The paper argues that innovations in agri-food and energy sectors can simultaneously reduce emissions, build climate resilience, improve food security, and reduce poverty. These sectors hold significant potential for novel products, processes, and policies that accelerate both climate mitigation and adaptation.
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Making Room for Place-Based Knowledge in Rural Classrooms
Rural classrooms can better serve students by incorporating place-based knowledge that reflects local communities and environments. The authors argue that integrating local context into curriculum strengthens educational relevance and student engagement in rural settings, moving beyond standardized approaches that ignore regional distinctiveness and community assets.
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Does Broadband Matter for Rural Entrepreneurs and Creative Class Employees?
Using county-level data across the continental U.S., this study examines whether broadband access attracts entrepreneurs and creative-class workers to rural areas. Contrary to common assumptions, the results show that higher broadband adoption actually correlates with fewer entrepreneurs and creative-class employees in rural communities. The findings challenge the notion that broadband alone solves rural economic development challenges.
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Californian innovation ecosystem: emergence of agtechs and the new wave of agriculture
California's agtech innovation ecosystem generates radical agricultural innovations through a distinctive combination of factors. Universities and research institutions develop new knowledge, venture capital and funding enable new businesses, and diverse actors—including accelerators and multinational companies—interact in complex networks with multiple roles. These interconnected characteristics create an environment where agricultural technology disruption thrives.
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Responsible Innovation Definitions, Practices, and Motivations from Nanotechnology Researchers in Food and Agriculture
Nanotechnology researchers developing food and agriculture products define and practice responsible innovation narrowly, focusing mainly on product safety and efficiency rather than broader principles like inclusion and reflexivity. Researchers hold conflicting views on whether responsible innovation serves industry interests or public good, and some pursue it primarily for reputation protection rather than societal benefit. The study recommends deeper discussions among researchers about what responsible innovation truly means beyond technical product attributes.
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Discovering innovation opportunities based on SECI model: reconfiguring knowledge dynamics of the agricultural artisan production of agave-mezcal, using emerging technologies
This study examined 44 mezcal producers in Oaxaca, Mexico to identify innovation opportunities in agave-mezcal production using the SECI knowledge model. Researchers found that producers need digital tools to improve their work and external connections. The study recommends developing a user-friendly mobile application for mezcal producers and creating a collaborative mezcal-tech-hub to strengthen producer networks and knowledge sharing.
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Exploring innovation creation across rural and urban firms
Rural and urban firms create innovation differently. Using national survey data on patent applications, the study finds that urban firms better leverage their resources for innovation. Rural firms benefit from university research and development support, though they don't value university information as highly. Rural firms willing to attempt innovation, even when failing, outperform those avoiding risk. The research reveals distinct innovation characteristics between rural and urban business environments.
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“We moved here for the lifestyle”: A picture of entrepreneurship in rural British Columbia
Rural entrepreneurs in British Columbia start businesses primarily for lifestyle reasons and persist despite marginal finances. The study finds that entrepreneurial opportunities and resources exist in rural environments, contrary to perceptions of hostility. Communities and governments can use these findings to develop context-specific policies supporting rural economic development.
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Functions of the Intermediary Organizations for Agricultural Innovation in<scp>M</scp>exico: The<scp>C</scp>hiapas Produce Foundation
Intermediary organizations bridge knowledge gaps between agricultural innovators and farmers. This study examines the Chiapas Produce Foundation in Mexico, analyzing how it connects small farmers with technology suppliers and researchers. The foundation manages public resources to promote agricultural innovation among farmers with varying economic conditions and innovation capacity, revealing critical functions these intermediaries perform in developing country agricultural sectors.
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Innovations in Government Responses to Catastrophic Risk Sharing for Agriculture in Developing Countries
Agricultural risk markets barely exist in developing countries, and even wealthy nations require heavy government subsidies to support crop insurance against natural disasters. These subsidies prove expensive and inefficient, sometimes worsening future catastrophes. The paper examines how governments with limited budgets can still foster agricultural risk-sharing markets for crop and livestock losses caused by natural hazards, identifying specific policy interventions that work without massive subsidies.
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Conservation Tillage and Cropping Innovation: Constructing the New Culture of Agriculture
This book examines how no-tillage farming technology spread among farmers through social networks and action-learning groups. The authors show that successful conservation tillage systems depend on farmer management and personal motivation to change. They analyze how deeply entrenched plowing culture was in both farming communities and broader U.S. and Australian societies, and how farmers overcame this cultural resistance through innovation networks.
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Can 5G Fixed Broadband Bridge the Rural Digital Divide?
5G fixed wireless access (FWA) can effectively bridge the rural digital divide by delivering broadband speeds comparable to urban services. The authors examine how 5G architecture improvements in recent 3GPP standards enhance rural FWA performance. They identify significant challenges operators face in planning and deploying rural 5G networks and outline research priorities needed to realize this technology's potential for rural communities.
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Rural Broadband and Precision Agriculture: A Frame Analysis of United States Federal Policy Outreach under the Biden Administration
The Biden administration's communications about rural broadband emphasize economic benefits, equity, and urgency, but largely ignore precision agriculture's role in sustainable farming. Analysis of federal policy messaging reveals five main frames, with broadband expansion framed as a nationwide issue affecting both rural and urban areas. The study finds a critical gap: policymakers rarely connect broadband access to agricultural sustainability, potentially undermining precision agriculture adoption in rural regions.
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An Overview of Rural Entrepreneurship and Future Directions
Rural entrepreneurship operates differently from high-growth and technology-focused entrepreneurship, yet researchers often apply the same frameworks to study it. This limits understanding of entrepreneurship's actual impact on rural communities. The authors argue rural entrepreneurship deserves recognition as a distinct field of study with its own characteristics, and they identify future research directions to advance knowledge specific to rural contexts.
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Agricultural education and extension curriculum innovation: the nexus of climate change, food security, and community resilience
Agricultural education and extension programs must integrate climate change, food security, and community resilience into their curricula. Rising natural disasters threaten food production and livelihoods. The paper argues that educators and extension agents need updated training and resources to help rural communities adapt to climate impacts, strengthen food systems, and build long-term resilience through practical, community-centered learning approaches.
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Rural and Non-Rural Digital Divide Persists in Older Adults: Internet Access, Usage, and Perception
Older adults in rural America face a persistent digital divide compared to urban peers. Rural residents aged 50+ have 29% lower odds of internet access and use technology less across communication, financial, health, and media applications. Rural non-users also perceive technology as overly complicated and difficult to learn. The study calls for targeted interventions to expand broadband infrastructure and digital skills training in rural communities.
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Intellectual Property and Agricultural Science and Innovation in Germany and the United States
The paper challenges the dominant U.S. theory that treats scientific knowledge as either a public or private good. By examining Germany's approach to agricultural science as a club good, the authors compare how the United States and Germany manage food and agricultural research differently. They argue these distinct approaches have different impacts on social welfare and call for democratic debate on how to best govern scientific knowledge for public benefit.
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Neoliberalism, the University, Public Goods and Agricultural Innovation
Agricultural research funding has shifted from government-led public institutions toward private funding and public-private partnerships over the past four decades. This trend risks neglecting public goods that don't generate profit. The authors document funding patterns across the USA, UK, Ireland, and Germany, finding that while neoliberal approaches appear in all four countries, their implementation and effects vary significantly based on national and institutional contexts.
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Design thinking for responsible Agriculture 4.0 innovations in rangelands
Agriculture 4.0 brings digital technologies like sensors, robotics, and data analytics to livestock farming on rangelands. This paper applies design thinking and responsible innovation frameworks to guide development of precision livestock farming technologies. The authors outline six design stages and show how responsible innovation dimensions—anticipation, inclusion, reflexivity, responsiveness, and equity—apply at each step. A case study of the Sustainable Southwest Beef Project demonstrates how this human-centered approach works in practice.
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Measuring the social and ecological performance of agricultural innovations on rangelands: Progress and plans for an indicator framework in the LTAR network
The Long-Term Agroecosystem Research Network developed an indicator framework to measure how agricultural innovations on rangelands perform across five domains: environment, productivity, economics, human condition, and social outcomes. The framework compares management innovations against site-specific benchmarks applicable to grazinglands worldwide. A key challenge remains scaling measurements from fine scales like individual ranches to broader landscape and community levels.
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International Comparison of the Efficiency of Agricultural Science, Technology, and Innovation: A Case Study of G20 Countries
This study measures agricultural science, technology, and innovation (ASTI) efficiency across G20 countries using data envelopment analysis. Developed G20 nations show declining efficiency trends but stronger innovation capacity, while developing G20 countries demonstrate rising efficiency but lower capacity. R&D spending redundancy and insufficient agricultural research output constrain efficiency gains. Technological change drives most productivity improvements across both groups.
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Scaling up innovations in smallholder agriculture: Lessons from the Canadian international food security research fund
Linear technology-transfer approaches to scaling agricultural innovations in low-income rural areas often fail because they ignore complexity, climate variability, and economic risks affecting smallholder farmers. This paper analyzes Canadian-funded projects that successfully scaled innovations and catalyzed sector-wide change. It proposes scaling principles that account for socio-ecological dynamics and recommends redefining impact metrics beyond narrow economic indicators to include sustainable agri-food system outcomes.
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Rural Elementary Teachers and Place-Based Connections to Text During Reading Instruction
Rural elementary teachers rarely help students connect reading materials to their local communities and places. Commercial textbooks provide minimal support for place-based learning, and standardized curricula often ignore students' rural contexts. The study found that teachers themselves must actively guide students to make meaningful connections between texts and their rural surroundings, as curriculum materials alone fail to bridge school learning with community realities.
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Successful agricultural innovation in emerging economies: new genetic technologies for global food production
This edited volume examines how genetic technologies and crop biotechnology drive agricultural innovation in emerging economies to address food security. It covers the scientific basis for genetically modified crops, their adoption across Africa, Argentina, China, and India, regulatory frameworks enabling innovation, and social and ethical considerations. The work argues that new genetic technologies offer practical solutions for improving food production and nutrition in developing regions.
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The Evolution of an Innovation System in a Rural Area: The Case of La Pocatière, Québec
This paper traces how an innovation system developed in rural La Pocatière, Quebec from 1830 to 2005. The authors identify four historical periods showing how institutions and innovation types evolved: pioneering agricultural institutions, growth in agricultural science, economic diversification into technology and transport equipment, and finally system redeployment. The study demonstrates that institutional change directly shaped the region's innovation trajectory across farming, science, and industrial sectors.
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Overcoming Challenges of Incorporating Higher Tier Data in Ecological Risk Assessments and Risk Management of Pesticides in the United States: Findings and Recommendations from the 2017 Workshop on Regulation and Innovation in Agriculture
U.S. pesticide regulation uses tiered testing to assess ecological risk, but lacks clear guidance on incorporating advanced higher-tier studies into risk decisions. A 2019 workshop brought together EPA, USDA, NOAA, universities, and industry to recommend improved communication between registrants and regulators, simpler study designs, transparent risk management criteria, and retrospective analysis of past decisions to strengthen how advanced data informs pesticide approval.
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Agricultural research organisations’ role in the emergence of agricultural innovation systems
Agricultural research organizations often serve as network brokers in innovation systems, but their effectiveness depends on objectives. In Mexico's MasAgro initiative, research organizations proved suitable for developing and scaling specific technologies. However, when innovation goals include extension and education alongside technology development, other actors are better positioned to coordinate the network and achieve broader outcomes.
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Induced Innovation in U.S. Agriculture: Time‐series, Direct Econometric, and Nonparametric Tests
This paper tests whether farmers innovate in response to input price changes—the induced innovation hypothesis. Using U.S. state-level agricultural data and three different statistical methods, the authors find little evidence that farmers develop or adopt technologies to save expensive inputs. The results hold consistently across all testing approaches, though the analysis focuses only on demand-side factors and cannot rule out that developing cost-saving technologies for expensive inputs may simply be too expensive.
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Growing Innovation Policy: The Case of Organic Agriculture in Ontario, Canada
This case study of organic agriculture in Ontario reveals how innovation operates across multiple scales—local, national, and global. The research identifies three key policy needs: strengthening local networks and farmer associations, correcting global subsidy inequities, and establishing national research funding and standards for organic production. These changes would create more resilient production and marketing systems. The study demonstrates that understanding innovation requires analyzing how different scales interconnect and influence each other.
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Do entrepreneurial food systems innovations impact rural economies and health? Evidence and gaps.
Local food system innovations—farmers' markets, community supported agriculture, farm-to-institution programs, and food hubs—aim to strengthen rural economies and improve food access and health. The authors review evidence on whether these entrepreneurial models help producers earn viable incomes, boost local economies, increase affordable healthy food access, and improve dietary outcomes. While some evidence supports each benefit, significant research gaps remain about their actual economic and public health impacts.
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Phosphorus dynamics and sustainable agriculture: The role of microbial solubilization and innovations in nutrient management
Phosphorus availability limits crop growth in many soils, and heavy reliance on chemical fertilizers causes environmental damage like water eutrophication. Phosphorus-solubilizing microorganisms—bacteria and fungi that convert insoluble phosphorus into plant-available forms—offer a sustainable alternative. Integrating these microbes into farming systems reduces chemical fertilizer dependence, improves soil health, and decreases phosphorus pollution while meeting growing food demand.
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Withdrawn as duplicate: Society of Behavioral Medicine (SBM) urges Congress to ensure efforts to increase and enhance broadband internet access in rural areas
The Society for Behavioral Medicine advocates for Congress to expand high-speed broadband access in rural U.S. areas to enable telehealth services. Better internet infrastructure would allow real-time healthcare delivery, increase access to specialists, and reduce rural health disparities. The organization calls for protecting and enhancing the National Broadband Plan through adequate funding, infrastructure investment, and regulatory reform to make rural internet services both high-quality and affordable.
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Efficiency of small enterprises of protected agriculture in the adoption of innovations in Mexico
Small protected agriculture enterprises in Mexico adopt innovations more efficiently when producers have higher education levels, greater farming experience, and access to extension services. The study identifies three distinct producer groups with different adoption behaviors. The research recommends strengthening connections among producers and improving extension services to support collective territorial development.
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Culture and entrepreneurial opportunity in high- and low-entrepreneurship rural communities
Rural entrepreneurs in high- and low-entrepreneurship communities conceptualize business opportunities differently than existing theory suggests. The study examined six rural communities across Pennsylvania, Wisconsin, and Maine, finding that entrepreneurs neither simply discover nor create opportunities in the ways literature describes. Instead, cultural context shapes how entrepreneurs recognize and act on opportunities, with different community actors holding equally valid but distinct views on opportunity emergence.
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THE STRUGGLE FOR BROADBAND IN RURAL AMERICA
Rural American communities face significant barriers to broadband access and adoption. The paper examines the challenges preventing rural areas from obtaining reliable high-speed internet infrastructure and identifies obstacles to technology uptake among rural populations. These barriers limit rural communities' ability to participate in the digital economy and access online services.
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A New Brand of Agriculture: Farmer-Owned Brands Reward Innovation
The U.S. Midwest commodity agriculture system efficiently produces and distributes meat and grain at low cost, but it prevents consumer preferences from reaching farmers. Farmer-owned brands can solve this problem by creating direct signals between consumers and producers, allowing farmers to capture premiums for differentiated products that consumers want but cannot currently obtain through commodity channels.
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To zoom or not to zoom: The impact of rural broadband on online learning
Rural students face significant barriers to online learning due to inadequate broadband access, creating a digital divide that affects their ability to participate in synchronous and asynchronous course delivery. The paper examines how rural broadband availability constrains higher education access and argues that faculty must consider internet infrastructure limitations when choosing content delivery formats to serve rural student populations effectively.
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The effect of broadband access on electronic patient engagement activities: Assessment of urban‐rural differences
Rural residents without broadband access use electronic patient engagement tools like email, text, and video consultations far less than urban counterparts. Between 2014 and 2018, rural areas consistently lagged in adopting these digital health technologies. Lack of broadband connectivity in rural areas significantly increased the likelihood of non-use of electronic patient engagement tools, suggesting that expanding rural broadband infrastructure could improve patient-provider communication.
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Opportunity, necessity, and no one in the middle: A closer look at small, rural, and female‐led entrepreneurship in the United States
Female entrepreneurs in rural America start businesses at higher rates in both the poorest and wealthiest counties, following a U-shaped pattern tied to per capita income. The poorest counties show necessity-driven entrepreneurship, while the wealthiest show opportunity-driven ventures. This finding supports place-based policies that address the distinct challenges women face in rural economic development.
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Benchmarking innovations and new practices in rural tourism development
Rural tourism in Asia can become more sustainable by adopting innovations and best practices from both within the region and internationally. The authors reviewed case studies from nine Asian countries plus New Zealand, Australia, Canada, Lesotho, and Poland to identify successful approaches. They found that Asian countries can replicate management strategies and development models from other nations to improve their own rural tourism initiatives.
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ENTREPRENEURSHIP IN RURAL AMERICA ACROSS TYPOLOGIES, GENDER AND MOTIVATION
This study analyzes how rural location affects early-stage entrepreneurship in America, comparing necessity-driven and opportunity-driven ventures across gender. Using data from 2005-2010, the researchers find that women in rural counties show higher rates of opportunity entrepreneurship than urban counterparts, especially with college education. Men in rural areas similarly show increased opportunity entrepreneurship. College education boosts opportunity entrepreneurship for both genders, while low income drives necessity entrepreneurship for women and part-time employment does so for men.
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Place-Conscious Capacity-Building: A Systemic Model for The Revitalisation and Renewal of Rural Schools and Communities Through University-Based Regional Stewardship
Universities can revitalize rural communities through place-conscious capacity-building, a model that uses culturally-responsive methods and institutional resources to strengthen local capabilities. Implemented at a post-compulsory institution in central Appalachia, the approach combines place-based learning with stakeholder engagement across multiple contexts to support public education and community economic development.
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Charting Digital Divides: Comparing Socioeconomic, Gender, Life Stage, and Rural-Urban Internet Access and Use in Five Countries
This paper examines internet access and use patterns across five countries, analyzing how socioeconomic status, gender, life stage, and rural-urban location create persistent digital divides. The authors document that the digital divide operates across multiple dimensions simultaneously, shaped by both technological infrastructure and social factors, with rural populations facing distinct barriers compared to urban counterparts.
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COMMUNITY ENTREPRENEURSHIP AMONG LOWER CASTES IN INDIA: A GRASSROOTS CONTRIBUTION TOWARDS POVERTY ALLEVIATION AND RURAL DEVELOPMENT UNDER CONDITIONS OF ADVERSITY AND ENVIRONMENTAL UNCERTAINTY
This article has been retracted and is no longer available for review.
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What a Pandemic Has Taught Us About the Potential for Innovation in Rural Health: Commencing an Ethnography in Canada, the United States, Sweden, and Australia
The paper examines how rural health systems in Canada, the United States, Sweden, and Australia built resilience and capacity during the pandemic. Using antifragility as a framework—the concept that systems strengthen under stress—the authors conducted ethnographic research to understand how rural health innovations emerged and persisted through crisis conditions.
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Challenges for Place-Based Mathematics Pedagogy in Rural Schools and Communities in the United States
Rural mathematics teachers in seven U.S. states attempted to connect math instruction to their communities. The study found that community-based math teaching primarily motivated lower-track students rather than advancing higher-level mathematics. Success depended on dedicated teacher champions and community belief in local futures. However, tensions between local relevance and universal academic standards reinforced social class divisions and encouraged youth to leave rural areas. The authors urge educators to clarify the actual purposes of place-based math education.
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Broadband access, citizen enfranchisement, and telecommunications services in rural and remote areas: a report from the american frontier [Topics in Wireless Communications]
Rural and remote areas of Montana lag significantly behind metropolitan regions in broadband access and online services, despite statewide averages suggesting parity with national levels. County-level data reveals uneven distribution of high-speed internet, limited e-government services, and gaps in digital infrastructure. The authors argue that targeted policy changes and infrastructure investments could reduce these inequities and provide rural residents with cost-saving alternatives to travel.
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The heterogeneous role of broadband access on establishment entry and exit by sector and urban and rural markets
Broadband access increases business formation and reduces closures overall, but effects vary significantly by sector and location. Construction and professional services gain establishments in both urban and rural areas. Finance, insurance, real estate, and information sectors grow only in cities. Retail shrinks in urban areas while manufacturing and hospitality decline in rural areas. Educational services shift from rural to urban locations.
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How can agricultural extension and rural advisory services support agricultural innovation to adapt to climate change in the agriculture sector?
Agricultural extension and advisory services must expand their roles to support farm innovation for climate adaptation. The paper finds that these services should connect diverse actors across sectors, facilitate learning and collaboration, and help farmers develop collective approaches to climate change. This broader, more networked approach to extension work is essential for agricultural sustainability under changing climate conditions.
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Agroecological Entrepreneurship, Public Support, and Sustainable Development: The Case of Rural Yucatan (Mexico)
Rural entrepreneurs in Yucatan, Mexico pursue agroecological businesses to support sustainable development, but face significant barriers. Public institutions provide minimal support due to competing political priorities, entrepreneurs lack training in agroecological methods, distribution channels are inadequate, and bureaucratic obstacles hinder business formation. Low consumer environmental awareness and weak producer networks further constrain these enterprises from generating wealth and rural development.
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Language Education for Newcomers in Rural Canada: Needs, Opportunities, and Innovations
Rural areas across Canada are receiving growing numbers of immigrants and refugees, yet research on their integration remains concentrated in major cities. Language education is critical for newcomer integration, enabling access to social, economic, cultural, and civic participation. This paper examines barriers and opportunities for language learning in rural Canadian communities, identifies promising practices and innovations already in use, and analyzes teacher education programs to support effective language instruction in smaller centres.
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Rural Health Networks and Care Coordination: Health Care Innovation in Frontier Communities to Improve Patient Outcomes and Reduce Health Care Costs
A frontier community implemented a community care team and care coordination program to improve patient outcomes and reduce healthcare costs. The program increased collaboration among 17 organizations serving 165 adults. Patients showed decreased emergency department use and similar physical health outcomes to national averages, though emotional health remained lower. Successful urban care coordination models applied effectively to rural settings, particularly through dedicated team facilitators, intensive coordination for complex cases, and technology-enabled specialty care access.
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Chapter 3: The Rural Public Library as Leader in Community Broadband Services
Rural public libraries can lead broadband adoption in their communities by serving as central anchor institutions. The paper proposes that libraries use education and training programs to maximize broadband's community impact and take active roles in planning local broadband infrastructure and services.
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The North Dakota Experience: Achieving High-Performance Health Care Through Rural Innovation and Cooperation
North Dakota addresses rural healthcare challenges through primary care support and medical home models, coordinated care networks, and technology innovation. The state demonstrates how cooperation between providers and strategic technology deployment can improve healthcare delivery in sparsely populated areas.
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Making the case for place based governance in rural health workforce recruitment and retention: Lessons from Canada and Australia
Rural communities worldwide struggle to recruit and retain health workers, creating healthcare access gaps between rural and urban areas. This study examines place-based governance approaches through case studies in Canada and Australia. The authors argue that effective rural health workforce strategies require context-specific benchmarks and cross-national collaboration to understand how place-making strategies can improve recruitment and retention in rural health services.
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Rural Telephone Company Adoption of Service Innovations: A Community Field Theory Approach*
Rural telephone companies in Iowa that actively participate in local economic development activities adopt telecommunications service innovations at higher rates than those that don't. The study distinguishes between service innovations (improving client offerings) and operations innovations (improving business efficiency), finding that community engagement directly drives adoption of new technologies to serve rural customers better.
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Understanding the Relationship of Science and Mathematics Place-Based Workforce Development on Adolescents’ Motivation and Rural Aspirations
Place-based workforce development in science and mathematics classes strengthens rural adolescents' motivation and aspirations to remain in their communities. Students exposed to more local STEM-related content and assets showed higher expectancy beliefs, greater interest in STEM careers, and stronger intentions to stay. The study confirms that connecting classroom learning to community needs and local opportunities cultivates both career interest and rural retention.
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Innovations in Practice: Dissemination and implementation of child–parent psychotherapy in rural public health agencies
Researchers trained clinicians at four rural public health agencies to deliver Child-Parent Psychotherapy, an evidence-based trauma treatment for young children. Half of the 112 client-caregiver pairs who started treatment remained enrolled or completed it. The study identifies specific barriers and facilitators to implementing this intervention in rural settings and confirms that evidence-based trauma treatment is feasible to deliver through rural community mental health agencies.
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Wealth, Entrepreneurship, and Rural Livelihoods
This paper examines the relationship between wealth, entrepreneurship, and rural livelihoods. The authors investigate how wealth accumulation and entrepreneurial activity shape economic opportunities and living standards in rural communities. The work connects financial resources to business creation and sustainability in agricultural and non-agricultural rural sectors.
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Delivery of rural and remote health care via a broadband Internet Protocol network – views of potential users
Rural and remote health providers in Alberta viewed a proposed broadband Internet Protocol network as valuable for expanding telehealth services and implementing electronic health records. Public-sector respondents felt more ready to adopt the technology than private-sector respondents. All groups identified the need for changes to health-service delivery practices as the main barrier to implementation.
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Place‐based subsidies and employment growth in rural America: Evidence from the broadband initiatives programme
The Broadband Initiatives Program, a $3.4 billion USDA initiative launched in 2010, significantly boosted employment growth in rural areas through 2019. The subsidies had stronger effects on startup job creation than existing businesses, particularly in goods production and information technology sectors. Micropolitan areas saw greater employment gains than remote rural locations or metropolitan areas.
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Managing innovation: a qualitative study on the implementation of telehealth services in rural emergency departments
This study examined how six U.S. healthcare systems implemented telehealth services in 65 rural emergency departments. Researchers interviewed 18 key staff members and identified three implementation stages: startup, utilization, and sustainment. They found that eight factors—strategies, capability, relationships, financials, protocols, environment, service characteristics, and accountability—either facilitated or hindered success at each stage. Healthcare systems can improve telehealth adoption by addressing these specific domains.
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Rural Regional Innovation: A Response to Metropolitan-framed Place-based Thinking in the United States
This paper examines place-based policy approaches to rural innovation in the United States, arguing that metropolitan-focused frameworks fail to capture rural realities. The author critiques how rurality is measured and how this shapes policy discourse, then proposes a rural regional innovation framework that accounts for distinct rural-metropolitan relationships and clusters. The work challenges regional science to better understand rural innovation dynamics.
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Push them forward: Challenges in intergovernmental organizations' influence on rural broadband infrastructure expansion
Regional Planning Commissions in rural Missouri struggle to advance broadband infrastructure despite it being a core goal. Interviews with 16 commissions reveal they face competing stakeholder pressures from residents, local governments, internet service providers, and state/federal agencies. While commissions advocate for broadband priorities to elected officials, they lack sufficient expertise and self-efficacy to effectively support planning efforts. The study proposes a framework combining behavioral and stakeholder theories to explain these dynamics.
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Place‐based learning processes in a family science workshop: Discussion prompts supporting families sensemaking and rural science connections using a community water model
A study of family learning in informal science workshops reveals how discussion prompts help parents and children make sense of water quality science and connect it to their rural community. Analysis of 12 families showed six types of sensemaking conversations emerged, with families using physical gestures across multiple surfaces to support their understanding. Discussion prompts that link abstract science to local experiences strengthen family engagement in informal science education.
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Enhancing integration of Indigenous agricultural knowledge into USDA Natural Resources Conservation Service cost-share initiatives
Indigenous agricultural knowledge practices in the American Southwest have sustained ecosystems for millennia, yet only 2% of USDA conservation cost-share contracts go to American Indian farms despite comprising 2.9% of U.S. farms. The paper demonstrates that Hopi dryland farming, Chippewa wild rice harvesting, and Menominee forestry practices align with NRCS conservation goals. The authors argue for integrating Indigenous practices directly into NRCS technical guides rather than requiring ad hoc approval processes, removing barriers to participation and preserving both ecosystems and Indigenous cultures.
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Future of Rural Transit
This paper examines how emerging technologies like automated vehicles and hologram telecommuting will reshape rural public transportation in the United States. The authors argue that these innovations will fundamentally change how rural areas are defined geographically, moving from discrete categories to a continuous spectrum based on population density. They identify key drivers of technological change and project significant long-term impacts on rural communities and transportation systems.
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Examining Key Stakeholder and Community Residents’ Understanding of Environmental Influences to Inform Place‐Based Interventions to Reduce Obesity in Rural Communities, Kentucky 2015
Rural Kentucky counties with obesity rates exceeding 40% face significant barriers to healthy living. Stakeholders and residents identified limited access to fresh produce and inadequate physical activity infrastructure as key problems. Residents concerned about obesity shopped more at supercenters, while those with information about physical activity opportunities reported better access to safe exercise spaces, sidewalks, and trails. These findings provide a foundation for designing community-specific interventions.
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Drivers of Innovation in Rural Tourism: the Role of Good Governance and Engaged Entrepreneurs
Good governance and engaged entrepreneurship drive innovation in rural tourism. Research in Ontario identified seven success factors: governance, human resources, investments, research, marketing, communication, and coordination. Engaged entrepreneurs enable incremental innovation that helps rural businesses survive economic challenges, while strategic governance—including bottom-up planning and federal coordination—creates conditions for sustainable tourism development. Local entrepreneurial leadership proves critical for product development and training.
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Simulation of a hybrid renewable energy system in rural regions
This paper develops a MATLAB simulator for hybrid renewable energy systems in rural areas. The system combines photovoltaic panels, wind turbines, and pumped water storage to supply residential and industrial loads, with a grid connection. The key innovation is an optimal control strategy that balances power generation and consumption in both grid-connected and islanded operating modes.
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Social Impact of Broadband Internet: A Case Study in the Shippagan Area, a Rural Zone in Atlantic Canada
This case study examines how broadband internet adoption affects rural communities in Shippagan, Atlantic Canada. The research documents the social impacts of broadband access in this rural zone, providing empirical evidence about how digital connectivity influences community life and development in remote Atlantic Canadian regions.
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From Rural Single-County to Multicounty Regional Transit Systems: Benefits of Consolidation
This study examines consolidating single-county rural public transit systems into multicounty regional systems in North Carolina. Researchers identified opportunities and barriers to regional integration, analyzed case studies of successful consolidations, and recommended programmatic and legislative changes to facilitate regional transit systems. The findings show that consolidation improves coordination of public transportation services across rural counties.
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Appalachian social entrepreneurship ecosystem: A framework for rural development
Social enterprises in rural Appalachian Ohio create economic development by leveraging regional champions, university partnerships, and multiple forms of capital. The study shows that successful rural social enterprise ecosystems depend on integrating community and economic development while preserving ecosystem services. This approach represents a fourth wave of rural economic development that moves beyond traditional models.
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Learning the Language of Home: Using Place-based Writing Practice to Help Rural Students Connect to Their Communities
Place-based writing practices strengthen rural middle school students' connections to their home communities. The study used critical pedagogy of place as its framework, examining how writing assignments help students explore and articulate their relationship with their local environment. Conducted in a North Carolina rural middle school, the qualitative research shows that writing about place shapes student identity and deepens community engagement.
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Innovation in the Rural Nonfarm Economy: Its Effect on Job and Earnings Growth, 2010-2014
Rural nonfarm businesses innovate at lower rates than urban establishments, but certain rural industries show high innovation intensity. Using nationally representative data from 2010-2014, the study finds that local innovation significantly influenced job and earnings growth during the post-recession recovery period, suggesting innovation drives economic resilience in rural areas.
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A New Role for Land Grant Universities in the Rural Innovation Ecosystem?
Land grant universities play a limited role in fostering innovation-driven entrepreneurship in rural America, contributing to persistent economic inequality and reduced wealth-creation opportunities. The authors identify why this gap exists and propose a new vision for how these institutions can more effectively support rural innovation and economic development through concrete actions.
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Super Network on the Prairie: The Discursive Framing of Broadband Connectivity by Policy Planners and Rural Residents in Alberta, Canada
This study examines Alberta's SuperNet broadband infrastructure project by comparing how government planners and rural residents differently understood and valued broadband connectivity. Through interviews, focus groups, and town halls, the researchers found that policy makers and rural communities held distinct visions of broadband's purpose. Rural residents themselves interpreted broadband differently based on their specific circumstances. Rather than simply equalizing access, broadband functioned as a complex mediator affecting opportunity, participation, and identity in rural communities.
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The digital health divide: Understanding telehealth adoption across racial lines in rural Illinois
Rural residents in Southern Illinois adopt telehealth at lower rates than urban residents, with significant racial disparities. Broadband access is a critical barrier—rural areas lack adequate infrastructure. Privacy concerns about data protection deter adoption across all demographic groups. Geographic location and race shape whether people use telehealth to reduce travel and childcare costs.
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Applying diffusion of innovation theory to examine providers’ perceptions of rural telehealth application and competencies
Rural Americans face worse health outcomes partly due to limited healthcare access. This study identifies best practices for telehealth in rural settings by examining how providers perceive and apply telehealth technology. The research consolidates five key telehealth application strategies and five essential provider competencies needed to deliver effective care to rural patients, with implications for medical education and practice.
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Consolidating passenger and freight transportation in an urban–rural transit system
This paper demonstrates that combining freight and passenger transportation on buses in urban-rural areas improves profitability and reduces costs. The authors developed a mathematical model to optimize coordination between these services and tested it through a case study. Results show that consolidating freight with passenger transport cuts logistics costs and increases bus company profits while benefiting society.
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Indigenous innovation and organizational change towards equitable higher education systems: the Canadian experience
Indigenous peoples in Canada have leveraged innovation discourse to push universities toward organizational change that incorporates Indigenous knowledges and worldviews. The study examined 15 research-intensive universities and interviewed 13 Indigenous people, finding that Indigenous groups successfully created normative shifts in institutional structure. Decolonizing approaches to innovation offer pathways to equitable higher education by centering reciprocity, ecological sustainability, and land connection over market-driven models.
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Rural Broadband Development in Canada’s Provinces: An Overview of Policy Approaches
Canadian provinces have used a mix of competitive market policies and targeted subsidies to achieve near-universal Internet access in rural and remote communities. The paper examines how public sector initiatives address private sector under-investment in rural broadband networks, showing that this combined approach effectively narrows the urban-rural digital divide.
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Evolving Rural Community Colleges With Innovation and Agility
Rural community colleges face growing pressure to innovate and adapt. The paper examines successful innovative practices already underway at various rural community colleges and provides recommendations for fostering and maintaining innovation across the sector. These changes help rural institutions meet evolving workforce and community needs.
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The impact of external knowledge sourcing on innovation outcomes in rural and urban businesses in the U.S.
External knowledge sourcing drives innovation in U.S. rural and urban businesses, but with different patterns. Rural firms benefit significantly from knowledge sources outside their own industry and from non-local organizations, while urban firms rely more on within-industry sources. The study uses survey data covering product, process, and green innovations across multiple industries, revealing that rural businesses depend more heavily on distant external knowledge networks to innovate successfully.
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Applying Indigenous Knowledge to Innovations in Social Work Education
This paper argues that social work doctoral programs should integrate indigenous holistic worldviews and the four Rs (relationships, responsibility, reciprocity, redistribution) alongside translational science and metacompetencies. These innovations prepare researchers for transdisciplinary teams tackling complex problems. The author contends this approach strengthens social work science, elevates its scholarly standing, embeds social work values in research, and reduces hierarchies between natural and social sciences.
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Does Broadband Matter for Rural Entrepreneurs or ‘Creative Class’ Employees?
This study examines whether broadband availability affects the presence of entrepreneurs and creative-class workers in rural American counties. Using 2012 national broadband data and census measures, the researchers apply spatial econometric analysis to test whether specific broadband thresholds—such as download speeds or provider numbers—correlate with entrepreneurship levels. The work addresses whether closing the digital divide through broadband infrastructure investment can meaningfully support rural economic growth through these key worker populations.
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Ensuring safe access to medication for palliative care while preventing prescription drug abuse: innovations for American inner cities, rural areas, and communities overwhelmed by addiction
This paper proposes innovations for delivering safe palliative care medications in underserved American communities while preventing prescription drug abuse. The author recommends establishing guarded medication dispensing centers in pharmacies, creating medication purchasing cooperatives to reduce costs, and expanding methadone programs to provide pain management and patient monitoring. These programs would integrate pharmacists, police, medical providers, and social workers to improve access while strengthening oversight and reducing diversion.
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Place‐Based Income Inequality Clusters in the Rural North Central Region, 1979–2009
This study maps income inequality clusters across 7,353 rural block-groups in the North Central United States from 1979 to 2009. The analysis reveals that persistently low-inequality rural areas actually experience worse demographic and economic outcomes than high-inequality areas, contradicting broader literature. Low-inequality places concentrate in traditional agriculture and manufacturing, while high-inequality places specialize in skilled service industries.
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Demand Forecasting for Rural Transit
Rural transit demand forecasting helps allocate limited transportation resources to underserved populations. This study developed three forecasting models based on usage data from four Washington counties to predict ridership on public transportation systems. The disaggregated transit demand model proved most refined and flexible, offering a practical tool for predicting transit needs in underserved rural areas.
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Using Wi-Fi for cost-effective broadband wireless access in rural and remote areas
This paper evaluates Wi-Fi technology as a cost-effective solution for delivering broadband internet to rural and remote areas where traditional DSL and cable services are unavailable or unaffordable. The authors model network economics using realistic costs, revenues, and demand patterns, comparing conventional Wi-Fi with advanced beam-forming antenna approaches. Their analysis demonstrates that wireless broadband can be economically viable and affordable in dispersed rural communities.
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Prototyping technology adoption among entrepreneurship and innovation libraries for rural health innovations
Entrepreneurship and innovation libraries across Europe, Asia, and the USA adopt Figma prototyping technology to support rural health startups. Previous experience, social impact, brand image, and system quality drive perceived usefulness, while usability, training, and self-efficacy influence ease of use. Both factors shape behavioral intention and actual adoption. Strategic partnerships between libraries, policymakers, and technology providers accelerate technology adoption and foster rural health innovation ecosystems.
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Intersectoral collaboration for the development of rural entrepreneurship in Latin America and the Caribbean
Intersectoral collaboration between governments, companies, NGOs, and local communities drives sustainable rural entrepreneurship in Latin America and the Caribbean. The study finds that such partnerships overcome barriers to rural entrepreneurship and promote innovation. Educational policies, gender equality support, and institutional backing prove essential. Intersectoral collaboration emerges as critical—not merely supplementary—for rural entrepreneurship success and regional socioeconomic development.
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Transition to the Fourth Industrial Revolution: Africa’s Science, Technology and Innovation Framework and Indigenous Knowledge Systems
Africa's science, technology, and innovation policies fail to adequately integrate indigenous and traditional knowledge systems into fourth industrial revolution strategies. The paper argues that African nations must develop deliberate, indigenous knowledge-sensitive STI frameworks to leverage local knowledge systems and ensure equitable participation in the bioeconomy and broader 4IR innovation ecosystem.
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Applications and innovations in typeface design for North American Indigenous languages
Indigenous North American language speakers face significant barriers when typing their languages due to inadequate typeface support. The paper documents typeface innovations developed by Indigenous communities and identifies the critical role of designers in creating tailored solutions. It highlights how cross-platform consistency remains unavailable for most Indigenous languages, contrasting with dominant languages, while celebrating emerging collaborations between type designers and Indigenous communities that offer promise for addressing these longstanding technical inequities.
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Disruptive innovation in rural American healthcare: the physician assistant practice
Physician assistant-owned primary care practices represent a disruptive innovation for rural healthcare. The model addresses physician shortages in underserved rural communities by offering lower costs, fewer competitors, high quality care, and sustainable competitive advantage. This business model solves chronic primary care shortages in rural areas facing educational, financial, and transportation constraints.
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Cost Estimating Tool for Early Estimates for Rural and Small Urban Transit Facilities
Construction cost overruns plague rural and small urban transit projects. This paper develops a cost estimating tool and database to address the lack of compiled cost information for these facilities. Researchers reviewed literature, interviewed transportation officials and consultants, surveyed historical cost data, and built regression models to predict design and construction costs. They identified typical risk factors and their frequency levels, delivering a practical tool to support early-stage cost estimation for rural transit projects.
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Electronic Medical Record Adoption in Oklahoma Practices: Rural‐Urban Differences and the Role of Broadband Availability
Rural and urban physician practices in Oklahoma show similar overall electronic medical record adoption rates, but significant differences emerge in specific subcategories. Solo rural practices adopt EMRs at higher rates than urban solo practices, as do rural psychiatric practices. Broadband availability shows no statistical relationship with EMR adoption. The findings suggest that targeted policies addressing specific practice types matter more than broadband expansion alone for increasing EMR adoption.
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Rural anchor institution broadband connectivity
Rural anchor institutions like libraries and schools face multiple barriers and enablers affecting broadband adoption. Research in rural Florida identified situational factors that influence whether these institutions successfully implement broadband connectivity. The study proposes a community-based planning model where multiple anchor institutions collaborate to jointly plan, deploy, and assess broadband infrastructure and adoption across their region.
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Challenges of the Rural Healthcare Pilot Program Broadband Initiative
The Federal Communications Commission funded a Rural Healthcare Pilot Program in 2007 to deploy broadband networks to rural areas. Researchers interviewed 40 funded organizations and found that 90 percent encountered challenges during planning. The main obstacles fell into two categories: program deployment issues and communication problems. The findings aim to help future telemedicine grantees navigate similar funding processes more effectively.
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Encouraging Entrepreneurship in Rural Communities: The University of Kentucky Entrepreneurship Initiative Program
The University of Kentucky Cooperative Extension Service developed a program to support rural entrepreneurship by engaging existing business owners to understand their needs and help them build profitable, sustainable enterprises. The program also uses insights from established entrepreneurs to design training that encourages new business creation in rural communities.
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Renewable Energy Integration into Industrial and Residential Buildings: A Study Across Urban, Rural, and Coastal Areas
This study evaluates how different renewable energy sources—photovoltaic, wind, geothermal, and biomass—perform when integrated into residential, commercial, and industrial buildings across urban, rural, and coastal areas. The research finds that photovoltaic energy works best for urban residential buildings, wind energy suits coastal industrial buildings, and geothermal energy provides the most consistent baseload power across all settings. Combining multiple renewable sources reduces grid dependence and improves sustainability more effectively than relying on single sources.
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Tribal and rural digital inclusivity: An examination of broadband access in two neighboring Great Plains states
Rural and tribal communities in Kansas and Oklahoma face significant broadband access gaps that worsened during the Covid-19 pandemic, particularly affecting students of color and economically disadvantaged families. The paper surveys challenges and successes in digital inclusivity across these Great Plains regions, examining technological leadership, information literacy, and public policy efforts to address persistent digital divides in underserved areas.
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The Center for Indigenous Innovation and Health Equity: The Osage Nation’s Mobile Market
The Osage Nation developed a tribal farm to address food insecurity and chronic disease among its citizens. When remote and mobility-limited community members couldn't access farm products, the Nation partnered with the Center for Indigenous Health Equity to conduct participatory research identifying food access barriers. This led to a mobile market delivering locally produced meats, herbs, and vegetables to underserved areas, prioritizing food sovereignty and addressing structural inequality.
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On subsistence‐type rural independent retailers and crowdfunded microfinance—Prosocial lending, nudges, and unintended consequences
Rural entrepreneurs at the bottom of the economic pyramid who sell subsistence goods face barriers when seeking crowdfunded microfinance. The study finds that repeat borrowers struggle more than first-time borrowers to secure funding on crowdfunding platforms, regardless of their business expansion plans. This reveals unintended consequences of shifting from traditional microfinance to web-based crowdfunding models for small, weakly integrated rural retailers.
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National, regional, and urban-rural patterns in fixed-terrestrial broadband internet access and cardiac rehabilitation utilization in the United States
Rural and Southern US regions show high cardiac rehabilitation eligibility but low participation rates, alongside widespread broadband internet gaps. The study reveals that rural areas lack broadband access more than urban areas, creating a critical barrier to telehealth cardiac rehabilitation. Policymakers must address broadband infrastructure before expanding telehealth rehabilitation programs in underserved regions.
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Rewards and employee creativity among rural healthcare employees: the mediating role of organizational support for innovation and the moderating impact of supervisory support
Rewards boost employee creativity in rural hospitals primarily by fostering organizational support for innovation. Supervisory support strengthens this relationship—when supervisors actively support innovation, the path from rewards to creativity through organizational support becomes significantly stronger. The study demonstrates that rural healthcare workers' creative contributions depend on how management structures rewards, organizational backing, and supervisory engagement together.
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Aspects of ICT connectivity among older adults living in rural subsidized housing: reassessing the digital divide
Low-income older adults in rural New England subsidized housing show unequal internet access and use despite living in broadband-accessible areas. Age and education significantly influence technology adoption for email and social media. While housing sites had broadband and nearby libraries, few offered free Wi-Fi to residents. Individual internet access varied widely, affecting social connections with family and friends, revealing persistent digital inequity among economically disadvantaged seniors.
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Remote and rural placements occurring during early medical training as a multidimensional place-based medical education experience
A medical school in Northern Ontario places second-year students in remote and rural communities for four-week clinical rotations to prepare them for rural practice. The study found that students, instructors, and institutions shared five core educational aims but differed significantly in emphasis and priorities. Students valued clinical training but undervalued community engagement, while teachers prioritized broader place-based learning. The research recommends curricula explicitly address these expectation gaps to improve rural medical education outcomes.
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Community at a Distance: Employing a Community of Practice Framework in Online Learning for Rural Students
Online library and information science education can use a community of practice framework to help rural students build professional networks and develop digital identities. This approach reduces the geographic and professional isolation that rural librarians face by fostering meaningful interactions and collaborative work in virtual environments, preparing graduates for careers requiring online collaboration.
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The CENTRAL Hub Model: Strategies and Innovations Used by Rural Women’s Shelters in Canada to Strengthen Service Delivery and Support Women
Rural women's shelters in Canada adopted a Hub Model combining community education, networking, technology, and resourceful leadership to improve service delivery for women experiencing intimate partner violence. The model successfully addressed challenges unique to rural areas where services differ significantly from urban shelters. Five innovative shelters demonstrated how this integrated approach strengthens support for the 25-30% of Canadian women affected by intimate partner violence.
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Place-based Inequality in “Energetic” Pain: The Price of Residence in Rural America
Rural households in America pay more for residential energy than urban households despite using less, creating what the authors call a rural tax. Analysis of two decades of data reveals persistent energy cost inequality between rural and urban places. This disparity poses serious risks to rural household well-being, especially during periods of sustained cost increases.
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Bridging the Gap between Entrepreneurship Education and Small Rural Businesses: An Experiential Service-Learning Approach
University students in retailing and hospitality management completed service-learning projects that helped small rural businesses develop sustainability plans and marketing strategies. The projects successfully built students' entrepreneurial competencies and self-efficacy while improving the competitiveness and brand image of participating rural businesses. The experiential approach combined real-world business challenges with classroom learning, demonstrating that hands-on engagement with actual rural enterprises strengthens both student skills and local business performance.
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China's Indigenous Innovation Policies Under the TRIPS and GPA Agreements and Alternatives for Promoting Economic Growth
China implemented Indigenous Innovation policies that favor government procurement of high-technology products with Chinese-owned intellectual property. The US and EU criticized these policies as trade barriers that commercialize foreign ideas in China. This paper analyzes whether these policies comply with TRIPS and GPA agreements, examines their economic rationale, and proposes alternative approaches—including increased R&D investment and stronger IP protection—that would allow China and foreign competitors to achieve technological growth without trade violations.
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The Rural Effect of Broadband Internet Service
Broadband internet access produces positive economic effects in rural communities, making them more competitive. Using quasi-experimental statistical analysis, the study finds evidence supporting the hypothesis that broadband investment strengthens rural economies. However, the author notes that further research is needed to establish causality more definitively.
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Financing rural innovation with community development venture capital: models, options and obstacles
Rural regions struggle to attract traditional venture capital despite needing local company growth for economic development. Community development venture capital (CDVC) offers a viable model for overcoming geographic barriers that deter conventional investors. This paper examines the structural obstacles CDVC faces and identifies potential funding sources to support rural entrepreneurship through patient capital.
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Distance Learning for Food Security and Rural Development: A Perspective from the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization
The FAO examines how distance learning can address food security and rural development globally. The paper reviews existing distance learning examples from FAO and other sources, then synthesizes debate about distance learning's potential in developing countries. It proposes five practical strategies for applying distance learning to food security and rural development challenges, aiming to share ideas with professionals and scholars worldwide.
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Enabling Broadband Internet Access in Remote and Rural Communities Using HAP-Based Multi-Hop FSO/RF Transmissions
This paper proposes a high-altitude platform system that delivers broadband internet to remote and rural communities using combined free-space optical and radio frequency transmissions. The system uses optical links for high-speed connections to demand hotspots and radio frequency for dispersed users across wide areas. Backup platforms automatically switch in when channel quality degrades, improving reliability and coverage while achieving high data transmission rates for both concentrated and dispersed populations.
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Minnesota's Digital Divide: How Minnesota Can Replicate the Rural Electrification Act to Deliver Rural Broadband
Rural Minnesota students lack adequate broadband access, which undermines their constitutional right to education. The paper argues that Minnesota legislators should adopt a policy framework modeled on the New Deal's Rural Electrification Act to build broadband infrastructure in underserved rural areas and ensure equitable educational opportunities.
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China’s Indigenous Innovation Policies
China launched indigenous innovation policies in 2006 using public procurement, megaproject funding, and technical standards to push domestic firms toward developing their own intellectual property. International trading partners criticized these policies, making them a flashpoint in US-China trade tensions. China continues supporting indigenous innovation despite global opposition.
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A Profile of Agricultural Education Teachers with Exemplary Rural Agricultural Entrepreneurship Education Programs
Teachers who run successful rural agricultural entrepreneurship programs share common traits: they have substantial teaching experience, hold advanced degrees, have personally practiced entrepreneurship, earn recognition as outstanding educators, and demonstrate open-mindedness and enthusiasm. These findings suggest that teacher quality and entrepreneurial background directly influence program effectiveness in rural agricultural education.
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Chinaʼs Indigenous Innovation Policies and the World Trade Organization
China's Indigenous Innovation Policies incentivize government procurement of products containing Chinese-owned technology and intellectual property. U.S. companies argue these policies discriminate against foreign firms and force technology transfer as a condition of market access. This article examines whether China's government procurement policies violate World Trade Organization obligations and concludes that China operates within its legal rights under international trade law.
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Ambiguity and Uncertainty in the “Last Mile”: Using Sense-making to Explore How Rural Broadband Networks Are Created
Alberta's government built a world-leading fiber-optic broadband network for rural communities in 2005, yet the province ranked last in rural broadband access by 2008. Using interviews and sensemaking theory, the authors found that industry decision-makers and stakeholders created self-fulfilling prophecies about the network through collective interpretation, which paralyzed efforts to promote actual community use of the infrastructure.
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Leading Community Innovation: Organizing Successful Rural Telecommunications Self-Development Projects
Five U.S. rural communities launched telecommunications self-development projects in the 1990s to revitalize declining economies. Strong public-private partnerships and decentralized project models increased success, while university-led projects performed worse. The study identifies six organizational and community processes that determine whether such initiatives succeed, offering lessons applicable to other rural development efforts.
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The Urban–Rural Digital Divide in Internet Access and Online Activities During the COVID‐19 Pandemic
Rural Nebraskans had significantly lower broadband internet access than urban residents during the COVID-19 pandemic. This infrastructure gap directly limited rural residents' ability to order food and groceries online, stream entertainment, and use videoconferencing for work and medical care. However, rural residents' lower engagement in social media, online gaming, education, and casual video calls reflected personal preferences rather than infrastructure constraints.
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Poor Representation of Rural Counties of the United States in Some Measures of Consumer Broadband
Rural counties in the United States are significantly underrepresented in major broadband speed test datasets. The researchers analyzed data from Measurement Labs and Ookla across 2020-2021, finding that very rural counties had far fewer fixed broadband speed tests per capita than urban counties, while mobile test patterns showed no rural-urban difference. This data gap undermines efforts to identify and address broadband gaps in rural communities that need telehealth access.
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Improving Access to Essential Medications in Rural and Low-Income U.S. Communities: Supply Chain Innovations for Health Equity
Rural and low-income U.S. communities face critical barriers to accessing essential medications due to geographic isolation, economic constraints, and inefficient supply chains. The paper examines supply chain innovations—including mobile pharmacies, micro-fulfillment centers, AI-driven forecasting, and blockchain technology—to improve medication delivery. It proposes regulatory frameworks and public-private partnerships to support these solutions and recommends federal and state policies to expand coverage for underserved populations.
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Conceptual distinction between agricultural innovation and rural innovation: implications for scientific research and public policy
This paper distinguishes agricultural innovation from rural innovation as separate conceptual approaches. Agricultural innovation focuses on farming technology and competitiveness, while rural innovation emphasizes endogenous development and social change. Analysis of Mexican research trends (2014-2018) and policies (2013-2018) shows that scientific work addressed both approaches, but government policy only pursued agricultural innovation despite widespread rural marginalization. The authors argue that recognizing these distinctions improves research clarity and enables policymakers to design interventions addressing rural inequality.
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“You're Poor, so You're Not Going to Do Anything:” Socioeconomic Status and Capital Accumulation as a Means to Access Higher Education for Rural Youth<sup>☆</sup>
Rural first-generation college students receive minimal practical guidance from family, school, and community members when deciding on higher education. Family educational background strongly influences whether students follow adult advice. Non-first-generation students choose selective universities primarily through family connections. State merit-based scholarships motivate rural students to attend top public universities regardless of first-generation status, with distance to campus playing a minor role in college choice decisions.
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When digital technology innovation enhances Indigenous Peoples’ e-participation in climate change resilience-building: perspectives under the “e-GIS Smart, Inclusive, and, Climate-resilient Indigenous Peoples Landscape and Community Clearing-House Mechanism Solution”
Digital GIS and satellite technology tools can help Indigenous Peoples participate in climate resilience and biodiversity conservation on their territories. The paper presents an e-GIS platform with mobile and app interfaces designed to facilitate Indigenous participation in decision-making and climate action while supporting data sovereignty and decolonization. Implementation requires state support and alignment with UN agendas on Indigenous affairs.
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Does Distance Learning Facilitate Diversity and Access to MSW Education in Rural and Underserved Areas?
Distance learning in social work education does expand access to rural and underserved areas. Analysis of 2018 graduate survey data shows that online and blended Master of Social Work programs increase workforce diversity by attracting older, working adults who might not attend traditional in-person programs, and graduates from these programs practice more frequently in rural and underserved communities.
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Measuring urban and rural establishment innovation in the United States
Patents are commonly used to measure innovation, but this study tests whether they work equally well in rural and urban areas. Using data from nearly 11,000 U.S. establishments, researchers compared patents against 39 alternative innovation measures. They found that patents reliably capture innovation in urban areas but perform poorly for rural establishments. The study recommends using different measurement approaches depending on whether establishments are urban or rural.
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Bringing Broadband to The Desert: Rural New Mexico, Fiberoptic Cable, and Electric Utility Cooperatives
New Mexico should allow commercial telecommunications companies to run fiber optic cables through electric utility easements to expand broadband access to rural communities. The paper argues that existing state law would likely prohibit this practice based on a recent Eighth Circuit ruling, but New Mexico's geographic isolation and lack of commercial incentives make broadband access critical. Preemptive legislation could enable fiber deployment through utility easements without violating easement restrictions.
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An Innovative Opportunity? Social Innovation, Entrepreneurship, and the Pedagogical Possibilities for Indigenous Learners
Social innovation pedagogy shares key features with Indigenous pedagogies in Canada, including experiential learning, reflection, and collaboration. The paper examines how these overlapping approaches can support Indigenous business students in building community resilience, while cautioning against forcing Indigenous knowledge systems into Eurocentric educational frameworks.
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Addressing Declining Rural Communities Through Youth Entrepreneurship Education
Rural communities in the United States face population decline and youth outmigration due to limited job prospects. Previous youth programs failed to address why young people leave or connect them to local opportunities. This paper recommends that Extension personnel redesign rural youth entrepreneurship education to emphasize technology and innovation, leverage 4-H as an experiential learning platform, and directly tackle the social factors driving rural youth flight.
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Rural schools and technology: Connecting for innovation
Three Canadian technology projects in rural schools—video conferencing, web-based distance education, and laptop computers—show that technology-driven curriculum innovations succeed when schools provide consistent, extensive support for teachers and students. Implementation challenges and successes reveal that effective distance education requires process-driven approaches that address both opportunity and strain on teaching and learning.
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Use of Alternative Fuels and Hybrids by Small Urban and Rural Transit
A survey of 115 small urban and rural transit agencies reveals that larger and urban providers adopt alternative fuels and hybrids more readily than smaller rural operators. Agencies pursue these technologies primarily for emissions reductions, public perception, and cost savings. Rural adoption lags due to concerns about infrastructure costs and fuel supply availability. The study documents actual experiences with biodiesel, E85, propane, natural gas, and hybrid vehicles across different community sizes.
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Facilitating the Production of Place-Based Knowledge for Participatory Community Development in Rural Pennsylvania
This case study examines how three rural Pennsylvania communities—Selinsgrove, Sunbury, and Danville—generated local knowledge through participatory planning processes to guide community revitalization. The research shows how inclusive engagement of adults and children in identifying local assets and priorities produces place-sensitive development outcomes. The findings demonstrate that community-generated knowledge improves development practice by grounding decisions in local context and values.
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Technology Adoption by Small Urban and Rural Transit Agencies
A national survey of rural transit agencies receiving federal Section 5311 funding examined technology adoption patterns. Larger agencies with bigger budgets and fleets adopted technologies like automatic vehicle location, scheduling software, GPS systems, and mobile data terminals at higher rates. Manager education, conference attendance, vendor interaction, and training participation significantly influenced adoption decisions. The findings help identify which agencies would benefit from technology investments and reveal unexpected adopters worth studying.
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All Things to All People: Challenges and Innovations in a Rural Community College
Rural community colleges face pressure to serve diverse adult learners with limited resources. New Mexico State University at Grants developed innovative approaches including career ladder strategies and on-site distributed learning to provide access to professional degrees in an economically distressed, culturally diverse county. These programs expand educational pathways for rural adult students.
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Broadband Internet Service Helping Create a Rural Digital Economy
Broadband internet service enables rural communities to participate in the digital economy by reducing geographic barriers to commerce and information access. The paper examines how broadband infrastructure supports rural economic development through business creation, job growth, and improved access to markets and services that were previously limited by distance and connectivity constraints.
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Making Sense of Broadband in Rural Alberta, Canada
Rural Albertans shaped how they understood and used the SuperNet, a government broadband infrastructure project. The research found that community members actively interpreted the technology through their existing internet practices and local needs. Economic, political, and cultural factors at provincial and national levels influenced how rural users adopted and creatively appropriated broadband access.
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Bridging the Digital Divide in Rural Appalachia: Internet Usage in the Mountains
This study examines how the Melungeon community in Appalachia uses the Internet to connect with others and trace their genealogy. Through oral history interviews, the research shows that Internet usage has become an effective tool for this historically isolated group to uncover community history, folklore, and family connections. A popular Melungeon website receives over 21,000 monthly hits, demonstrating significant digital engagement within the community.
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Rural broadband usage: analysing satisfaction and internet speed
Rural households in the US Midwest use less internet throughput than satisfied households require, revealing a gap between actual consumption and satisfaction needs. Researchers collected high-resolution data through device monitoring and surveys, finding connections between internet speed, reliability, and user satisfaction. These findings challenge how broadband standards are currently set for rural areas.
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Analysis of rural broadband adoption dynamics: A theory-driven agent-based model
Rural broadband adoption lags behind demand, especially after COVID-19 exposed digital divides. This paper develops an agent-based model grounded in behavioral theory to predict how rural residents adopt broadband internet. The model shows that adoption rates rise when more neighbors already use internet and when prices drop. Policymakers and internet providers can use such simulations to target infrastructure investment and design subsidies that effectively reduce the digital divide.
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Assessing the Viability and Impact of Off Grid Systems for Sustainable Electrification of Rural Communities in Sub-Saharan Africa
Off-grid solar minigrids offer a viable solution for rural electrification in sub-Saharan Africa, where centralized power systems have failed to reach communities. The research identifies key barriers to adoption including high capital costs, land expenses, and long break-even periods. Techno-economic analysis reveals that economic viability, regulatory frameworks, and technical challenges—measured through levelized cost of electricity—determine whether these systems succeed in rural areas.
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Attitude toward innovation and its implications for rural community development in Mexican peasant organizations
Mexican peasant organizations show balanced attitudes toward innovation when examined through psychological and social factors. High social capital and good information access promote positive innovation attitudes, while cultural values present fewer barriers than commonly assumed. The study challenges stereotypes of rural communities as inherently resistant to change, revealing instead that innovation attitudes develop in response to territorial risks and constraints.
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Investment in community-based rural health care innovation to address health inequities in Australia
Rural Australians face higher chronic disease rates, lower life expectancy, and poor healthcare access due to distance and workforce shortages. The authors argue that investment in community-based rural health research is critical to address these inequities. They demonstrate that place-based partnerships between researchers, hospitals, and community organizations—including innovative models like community paramedicine—improve patient outcomes and reduce hospital admissions, yet receive only 2.4% of national health research funding.
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America or India: Identifying a Suitable Off-Grid Rural Electrification Model for Nigeria.
Nigeria's rural electrification lags because grid expansion is slow and centralized. This paper compares American and Indian approaches to rural electrification. America built a robust national grid, while India rapidly expanded rural access through decentralized, renewable energy-based off-grid systems. India's model proves faster and more effective for rural electrification in developing countries like Nigeria.
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Coverage is Not Binary: Quantifying Mobile Broadband Quality in Urban, Rural, and Tribal Contexts
This paper measures mobile broadband quality across urban, rural, and tribal areas in the United States. The researchers found that LTE networks in tribal and rural regions deliver significantly worse performance than urban networks, with 9 times poorer video quality, 10 times higher video delays, and 11 times worse throughput, even when customers have identical service plans. Coverage alone does not guarantee usable service.
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REVIEW ON RURAL ENERGY ACCESS POLICIES
Rural energy access remains neglected in developing countries, leaving nearly two billion people without electricity or clean cooking. This systematic review examines rural energy policies as solutions to energy poverty, analyzing challenges, barriers, and alternatives. The authors argue that comprehensive rural energy policy is essential for achieving universal energy access and sustainable development, with particular focus on Latin America and the health and environmental impacts on rural communities.
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Rural Development Research and Policy: Perspectives from Federal and State Experiences with an Application to Broadband
Rural economies persistently face disadvantages despite changing over time. This paper examines rural development research and policy at federal and state levels, drawing on broadband work experience. The author argues that better integration among federal and state governments, academia, and the private sector is essential for solving rural economic challenges. Stronger relationships between researchers and field practitioners would help anticipate future needs and enable timely problem-solving support.
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Shaping “Digital Futures” in Alberta: Community Engagement for Rural Broadband Development
This paper examines the Digital Futures initiative in Alberta, a biannual symposium bringing together public, private, and community stakeholders to address rural broadband development. The authors show how iterative community engagement mechanisms create a productive cycle linking research and practice, demonstrating how engaged communications research tailored to local contexts can advance broadband deployment and sustainability in rural areas.
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Improving schooling outcomes for Latinos in rural California: A critical place-based approach to farmworkers history
A place-based education project in California's Central Valley engaged Latino and Filipino community college students in learning about the Farmworkers Movement through oral history. Students significantly improved their historical thinking skills, biliteracy abilities, and bicultural identity. The approach shows promise for improving Latino schooling outcomes at both junior college and K–12 levels in rural agricultural regions.
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The Social Justice Framework in the Information Technology Rural Librarian Master’s Scholarship Program: Bridging the Rural Digital Divides
A scholarship program trained sixteen rural librarians in Appalachia to earn master's degrees through distance education, using a social justice framework. The program recruited paraprofessionals from Southern and Central Appalachian libraries and delivered part-time coursework synchronously online from 2010 to 2012. The initiative addressed digital divides by building local information technology capacity in underserved rural communities.
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The New Telecommunications Sector Foreign Investment Regime and Rural Broadband
Canada's new foreign investment rules and wireless spectrum auctions aim to increase competition but will likely fail rural communities. Analysis shows new entrants prefer urban markets, and current regulations weaken the government's ability to meet telecommunications policy goals. The authors argue Canada needs a comprehensive national broadband plan rather than relying on market forces to deliver 4G services to rural and remote areas.
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The Need for Technological Innovations for Indigenous Knowledge Transfer in Culturally Inclusive Education
Indigenous knowledge systems in remote and rural communities face extinction due to colonization and cultural displacement. The paper proposes using information and communications technology to preserve oral and traditional knowledge systems and integrate them into community education. Technological innovation can help gather, store, and retrieve indigenous knowledge to support culturally inclusive education.
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Generator selection for rural electrification from renewable energy
This paper addresses generator selection for rural electrification systems powered by renewable energy. The authors develop detailed models of different generator types and examine how equipment faults affect system safety and performance. They provide practical guidance on selecting appropriate generators for decentralized power generation in rural areas, accounting for personnel safety on connected feeders.
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Individuals’ Attitudes Toward Public Transit in a Rural Transit District
Rural commuters in the United States face higher transportation costs than urban residents, especially during periods of high gasoline prices. This study surveyed rural commuters to determine whether they would use public transit if available and what factors influence their decision. The research found that commuters do prefer public transit service, and sustaining it requires focusing on the service attributes that matter most to users.
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Indigenous Knowledges Driving Technological Innovation
Indigenous peoples use geospatial technologies to protect tribal self-determination and preserve cultural knowledge. However, Western geospatial tools misrepresent Indigenous ontologies and epistemologies. The authors advocate developing new technologies aligned with Indigenous ways of knowing to better express and preserve cultural heritage while supporting cultural survival.
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Advanced LED Warning Signs for Rural Intersections Powered by Renewable Energy
Researchers developed and tested an advanced LED warning system for rural intersections with poor sight lines due to curves. The system actively detects approaching vehicles and activates LED warning signs for conflicting traffic movements, addressing the ineffectiveness of static warning signs at rural through/stop intersections. The team evaluated driver behavior through video analysis and surveyed local residents and frequent users.
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The Case for the Development of Public Transit in an Urban Boundary Rural Area
A survey of commuters in a rural area bordering a metropolitan region reveals that people would use public transit if available, driven by concerns about fuel costs and pollution. Educated and younger residents show the strongest preference for transit, challenging assumptions that rural populations inherently prefer automobiles.
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Generators for rural electrification from renewable energy
This paper develops mathematical models for three types of generators—three-phase induction, single-phase induction, and permanent magnet generators—to power rural electrification systems using wind and biomass energy. The models account for transient responses and machine parameters to design reliable systems that handle power line imbalances and faults better than conventional approaches. Simulations in Matlab-Simulink demonstrate the generator performance.
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Implications on Rural Adult Learning in the Absence of Broadband Internet
Rural adults lack broadband internet access, limiting their participation in online learning. This study identifies seven predictors that influence why rural learners choose online education despite connectivity barriers. The research reveals that rural learners have different educational needs and preferences than urban counterparts, and broadband expansion could reduce isolation while improving literacy programs and learning outcomes in dispersed communities.
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Building assets to reduce vulnerability: microfinance provision by a rural working people's union in Mexico
Proyecto Tequisquiapan, a rural microfinance union in Mexico, provides deposit facilities and protective financial services that help vulnerable households build assets and manage financial shocks. The organization succeeds through small-scale operations, committed staff, and continuous innovation tailored to members' needs. The authors argue this model outperforms large-scale commercialized microfinance and warrants World Bank attention.
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A Rural Transit Vehicle Management System and Condition Predictor Model
Researchers developed a computer database system and predictive model to help Alabama manage its rural transit fleet. The system tracks vehicle conditions and predicts individual vehicle ratings without requiring costly physical inspections. This tool enables the state transportation department to make equitable decisions about vehicle acquisition and disposal across regions with varying road conditions and socioeconomic circumstances.
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Social vulnerability, lower broadband internet access, and rurality associated with lower telemedicine use in U.S. Counties
Analysis of 8 million U.S. telemedicine sessions reveals that rural counties use telemedicine at lower rates than urban counties. Broadband internet access and rurality are stronger predictors of telemedicine use than social vulnerability factors. The relationship between social vulnerability and telemedicine adoption differs significantly between rural and urban areas, with greater variability in urban counties.
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Integrating community assets, place-based learning, and career development through project-based learning in rural settings
Rural middle school teachers and counselors collaborated to design project-based learning units connecting STEM careers to local community needs. Three educator teams successfully engaged community members and highlighted career pathways, but struggled with consistent learning assessment practices. The study demonstrates that place-based education can strengthen rural STEM instruction when supported by sustained professional development tailored to rural educators' isolation and resource constraints.
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Constructing an Indigenous knowledge approach to agroecology and regenerative agriculture: The case of Yucatec Maya
Yucatec Maya farmers are abandoning traditional sustainable practices for conventional agriculture, driven by climate change and resource degradation. This paper reveals how Indigenous Yucatec Maya concepts—including diversity, resilience, food security, and sovereignty—underpin their traditional food systems. The authors argue that integrating this Indigenous knowledge with agroecology and regenerative agriculture approaches will strengthen food system transformation and increase long-term success.
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Mapping and Spatial Analysis to Expand Rural Broadband Access
Rural broadband access remains limited despite its importance for economic development and precision farming. This paper presents GIS and remote sensing methods to identify where broadband expansion would have the greatest agricultural impact and to locate vertical infrastructure assets that could support network expansion. Applied to Illinois counties, the approach quantifies crop production potential in unserved areas and automates mapping of suitable tower locations using LiDAR data to guide broadband investment decisions.
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An interdisciplinary telemedicine innovation to enhance pediatric diabetes care in rural communities: A proposed practice initiative
A nurse-led telemedicine model improves pediatric diabetes care in rural communities by eliminating long-distance travel to appointments. The initiative uses telehealth technology to increase access to specialty care, reduce costs, and improve patient outcomes. The approach is feasible, reimbursable, and accepted by families and providers, demonstrating how nurses can lead innovative care delivery models in rural settings.
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Bridging the rural divide: The impact of broadband grants on US agriculture
The Community Connect Grants Program, which funds broadband infrastructure in rural US communities since 2002, increased crop productivity by 9.3 percent within three years of receiving grants. Low-income areas saw even larger gains, ranging from 6.3 to 13.8 percent. The study demonstrates that expanding high-speed broadband in rural regions directly boosts agricultural productivity.
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Shaping change locally: a place-based STEM project’s influence on rural elementary and middle grade students
A rural elementary school's place-based STEM project on wildlife-vehicle collisions shifted students' identities toward seeing themselves as problem-solvers, advocates, and community members. Students developed stronger environmental responsibility and STEM competence through authentic scientific inquiry and public advocacy. The project fostered real-world problem-solving and agency, demonstrating that locally relevant STEM education empowers rural students to engage as capable learners and active community participants.
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Hybrid Renewable Energy Systems: An Integrated Approach to Rural Electrification
Hybrid renewable energy systems combining solar, wind, hydro, and biomass offer transformative potential for electrifying remote rural areas in developing nations. These integrated approaches leverage diverse local resources to overcome grid isolation, reduce carbon emissions, and provide equitable energy access. Supportive policies and growing research momentum position hybrid systems as revolutionary solutions for rural electrification strategies.
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Homeowners’ Motivations to Invest in Energy-Efficient and Renewable Energy Technologies in Rural Iowa
Rural Iowa homeowners adopt energy-efficient and renewable energy technologies primarily to reduce energy costs, driven by local availability of products and environmental concerns. High upfront costs, lack of information, and limited local access to appliances and contractors create barriers to adoption. Rural households face disproportionately high energy burdens, making these technologies valuable but underutilized in rural areas compared to urban regions.
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The Alberta Indigenous Mentorship in Health Innovation Network: approach, activities and reflections of an Indigenous mentorship network programme
The Alberta Indigenous Mentorship in Health Innovation Network supports First Nations, Métis, and Inuit scholars pursuing health research careers through intergenerational mentorship, funding, and professional development activities. The program strengthens scholars' personal and professional resources while advocating for systemic changes in academia and health research to promote Indigenous success. The authors describe their mentorship philosophy, organizational structure, and adaptations made during the COVID-19 pandemic.
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Place-based rural health professional pre-registration education programs: a scoping review
Place-based health professional education programs train students in rural communities to address healthcare workforce shortages. A review of 138 programs across 12 countries identified four training models: short-term placements, extended placements, rural campuses, and distributed blended learning. Programs recruit local students, engage communities in selection and delivery, and evaluate graduate work locations and access outcomes. Successful programs combine widening educational access, comprehensive design, and community engagement aligned with social accountability.
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The double disadvantage of rural place-based policies
Rural regions face a double disadvantage under current place-based policies: they lack the agglomeration economies and institutional capabilities that urban areas possess. This scoping review of 2008–2022 literature shows that place-based policies, particularly the urban-centric smart specialisation model, fail to address rural needs. The authors argue that effective rural policy must move beyond urban templates, strengthen rural institutions, accept that growth isn't essential, and develop genuinely tailored strategies recognizing peripheral regions as valuable assets.
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Research on energy storage planning methods for distributed renewable energy integrated rural power distribution networks
This paper develops an optimization method for placing and sizing energy storage systems in rural power networks that integrate renewable energy. Using clustering analysis of load and generation data, the researchers create a cost-minimization model and test it on a standard 33-bus system. The optimized energy storage placement reduces operational costs, cuts wind and solar curtailment losses, stabilizes voltage, and improves overall network efficiency.
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Optimizing off-grid PV/wind systems with battery and water storage for rural energy and water access
This paper develops an optimization framework for off-grid renewable energy systems combining solar panels, wind turbines, batteries, and water storage to serve rural communities. The system uses an energy management algorithm and genetic optimization to balance electricity supply, water access, and costs. A case study in Quebec demonstrates the system can reliably power homes and pump water while reducing diesel dependence, with payback periods of 8–12 years and electricity costs of 16–23 cents per kilowatt-hour.
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Can telemedicine reach rural, older veterans on the edge of or caught in the digital divide? – Unique considerations for two distinct populations
A national telemedicine program serving rural older veterans through VA clinics identified two distinct populations with different barriers to digital healthcare. Some veterans on the edge of the digital divide faced access risks from declining health or economic status. Others were completely caught in the divide—lacking reliable internet, devices, or skills—including isolated veterans with trauma histories and institutional distrust. The study reveals that structural supports must address these specific contextual factors to expand telemedicine reach.
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Place-based strengths and vulnerabilities for mental wellness among rural minority older adults: an intervention development study protocol
Rural minority older adults in the United States face severe depression inequities driven by economic insecurity, trauma, transportation gaps, and limited service access. This study examines protective place-based factors like social support and community attachment alongside vulnerabilities among American Indian and Latinx older adults in New Mexico. Researchers will conduct surveys, interviews, and network analysis to understand how these factors shape depression experiences, then develop a community-driven intervention addressing place-based causes of mental health disparities.
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The association between rurality, places of care and the location of death of long-term care home residents with dementia: A population-based study
This study analyzed 65,375 long-term care residents with dementia in Ontario between 2014 and 2019. Rural residents were more likely to die in their care homes, while urban residents experienced more hospitalizations and died outside care facilities. Urban LTC homes sent residents to hospitals at roughly double the rate of rural homes, suggesting geography shapes end-of-life care patterns for dementia patients.
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Integration of renewable energy-powered cold storage solutions for reducing post-harvest food waste in rural agricultural areas
Researchers developed a renewable energy-powered cold storage system combining solar and wind power with smart sensors and AI for rural farms. Field trials in the UK and US showed the system reduced post-harvest food waste by 43.5%, extended produce shelf-life by 300%, and increased farmer income by 43%. It cut greenhouse gas emissions by 80% compared to diesel systems and achieved strong economic returns and farmer adoption rates.
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Data-Driven Approach to State of Good Repair: Predicting Rolling Stock Service Life with Machine Learning for State of Good Repair Backlog Reduction and Long-Range Replacement Cost Estimation in Small Urban and Rural Transit Systems
This paper develops a machine learning model to predict when transit vehicles need replacement in small urban and rural U.S. transit systems. Using historical data from retired vehicles, the model applies random forest and gradient boosting techniques to estimate service life, identify maintenance backlogs, and forecast replacement costs. The tool helps transit agencies maintain vehicles in good repair, reduce backlogs, and make better funding decisions for asset management.
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Scope economies from rural and urban microfinance services
Microfinance institutions serving both rural and urban markets experience different cost outcomes depending on their business model. Loan-only MFIs gain cost advantages from diversification across markets, achieving 16.6% scope economies. However, savings-and-loan MFIs face 11.7% scope diseconomies, suggesting they perform better by specializing. Over time, loan-only MFIs improved at serving harder-to-reach clients while savings-and-loan MFIs reduced their cost disadvantages from diversification.
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EXPANDING RURAL BROADBAND IN AMERICA: CHALLENGES, OPPORTUNITIES, AND POLICY IMPLICATIONS
Rural areas in the United States lack reliable, affordable broadband access, creating economic, educational, and social inequities. This paper examines barriers to rural broadband deployment and identifies solutions including community-led initiatives, public-private partnerships, and federal programs like BEAD. The author recommends sustainable funding models, improved regulations, and emerging technologies to achieve universal connectivity and reduce digital disparities.
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Sisyphus’s Broadband: Exploring models of rural community participation in digital infrastructure and connectivity
Rural communities face persistent digital divides in infrastructure and internet access. This paper develops a set of models describing different approaches rural communities use to build local internet connectivity. The models aim to help communities understand their options and challenges when pursuing community-led digital infrastructure initiatives, addressing a gap in empirical evidence about which approaches work best.
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Online grocery purchasing in Mississippi: associations with broadband, rurality, and household characteristics
Higher education and income levels increase online grocery purchasing adoption in Mississippi, while age and rural residence act as barriers. Broadband quality shows inconsistent associations with online grocery use despite widespread internet disparities. The study reveals that both structural factors like internet access and individual characteristics shape whether rural and low-income residents use online grocery services.
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Looking beyond digital broadband speeds: Rural British Columbian’s experiences with internet connectivity as a basic necessity
Rural British Columbians with and without high-speed internet show more similarities than differences in digital readiness and confidence. Those without high-speed access tend to be older, more remote, use fewer devices, and experience more frustration, yet use the internet at comparable frequencies. Both groups recognize connectivity benefits but report disconnects between expectations and reality of high-speed internet service.
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Perspectives from Rural Maine Educators: Supporting and Inspiring Youth Through Place-Based Education
Rural Maine educators naturally implement place-based education by connecting youth learning to local environmental changes, seasonal industries like potato and maple production, and community knowledge. The study of nine educators shows that place-based approaches build engagement and collaboration, though they demand more time, relationships, and curricular flexibility than traditional instruction. Rural contexts provide ideal conditions for this pedagogy, preparing young people to become resilient community leaders.
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Storying the FEW Nexus: A Framework for Cultivating Place-Based Integrated STEM Education in Rural Schools
Rural schools often teach STEM disconnected from students' lives and communities. This paper presents Storying the FEW Nexus, a framework combining food, energy, and water resource education with place-based learning for K-12 rural students. The approach integrates STEM with local narratives and social sciences to help students develop sustainable solutions to environmental challenges specific to their communities, grounding abstract knowledge in authentic rural contexts.
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Place-Based Diminished Returns of Economic Resources in Rural America: A Framework for Understanding Geography-Conditioned Inequality
Rural residence in the United States weakens the protective effects of socioeconomic status on health, education, and behavioral outcomes, even for non-Hispanic White populations. The authors extend the Marginalization-related Diminished Returns framework to show that structural disadvantages in rural areas reduce how effectively education, income, and other resources translate into improved outcomes. Policy interventions must address place-specific constraints that limit opportunity rather than simply increasing resources.
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Home-Based Digital Technologies to Support Aging-in-Place for Rural African American People With Alzheimer Disease and Their Care Partners: Protocol for a Mixed Methods Feasibility Study
This study investigates remote monitoring technologies to support rural African American people with Alzheimer's disease aging at home. Researchers will identify barriers to aging-in-place and assess attitudes toward remote monitoring, then test a home-based system over 18 months to measure usability, acceptability, and feasibility. Findings will guide development of tailored interventions for this underserved population with the highest dementia rates but least access to formal care.
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Using renewable energy for rural connectivity and distance education in Latin America
Renewable energy technologies, particularly photovoltaic systems, enable rural connectivity and distance education services across Latin America, especially in isolated communities without grid electricity. Sandia National Laboratories and partners support this expansion through capacity building and technology development, focusing on Mexico and Central America with funding from USAID and the US Department of Energy.
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Training Rural Educators in Kentucky through Distance Learning: Impact with Follow-up Data
The TREK-DL project delivered distance education courses in special education to rural Kentucky graduate students since 1989. Surveys showed students were satisfied with course content and delivery formats, though technology issues occurred. Graduates implemented best practices for children with disabilities in their work and shared these practices with colleagues, creating systemic changes at their employment sites.
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Broadband and rural development: Impacts of the U.S. Department of Agriculture Broadband Initiatives Program on saving and creating jobs
The USDA's Broadband Initiatives Program reduced employment losses in rural areas compared to non-program regions, with stronger effects in metropolitan counties and service sectors. Businesses in program areas showed better survival rates than those outside the program, though impacts varied by location, business type, and industry.
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Innovation in Community-Based Participatory Research (CBPR) Education: A Summer Institute on Indigenous and Critical Methodologies
The University of New Mexico developed a summer institute teaching community-based participatory research (CBPR) using indigenous and critical methodologies grounded in Freirean pedagogy. The curriculum organizes CBPR around four domains: context, partnering processes, intervention/research, and outcomes. Since 2010, over 620 participants including students, faculty, community members, and practitioners completed the institute, gaining practical skills to apply CBPR principles in academic and community settings.
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Mobile Health and Chronic Care: Using GIScience to Assess Health Care Accessibility among Broadband Subscribers in Nebraska’s Micropolitan and Rural Areas
This study uses geographic information systems to analyze how broadband internet access affects rural and micropolitan residents' ability to reach healthcare providers for chronic conditions. Researchers compared travel times to medical facilities for broadband customers in Nebraska, revealing differences between rural and micropolitan areas. The findings show how internet speed variations influence who can actually use mobile health services, demonstrating GIScience's practical value for addressing rural healthcare access problems.
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Planning for Rural Broadband
Rural broadband expansion programs receive insufficient uptake because communities lack awareness and planning capacity. This study examines university-community partnerships in two Florida counties that successfully facilitated broadband planning discussions. The researchers identify how local partnerships mobilized community resources and planning practices, then recommend strategies for replicating community-based broadband planning approaches in other rural areas.
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Indigenous Innovators: Creating Collaborative Student-Engineer Innovation Teams between Tribal Colleges and Research Institutions
A tribal college and research university in North Dakota collaborated on a biomedical engineering project to design a running prosthetic limb. The tribal college provided advanced manufacturing capabilities and indigenous problem-solving approaches, while the university contributed innovation-based learning and computational resources. The partnership successfully combined indigenous ways of knowing with modern engineering tools, demonstrating how cross-institutional collaboration between tribal and research institutions strengthens student innovation teams and produces practical solutions.
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Indigenous Language Revitalization and Preservation in Canada: Strategies and Innovations
Indigenous languages in Canada face endangerment due to historical assimilation policies and residential schools. This paper examines current revitalization initiatives, government programs, and legislation supporting Indigenous language preservation. The author argues that new strategies using digital technologies and internet platforms can make language revitalization resources more accessible and effective across Canada.
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Place-based generosity during the pandemic: Innovative rural philanthropic organizations’ responses to COVID-19 and (re-)building resilient rural communities in Canada
Rural philanthropic organizations in Canada adapted their operations during COVID-19 to address emerging community vulnerabilities. Interviews with leaders across Atlantic Canada, Ontario, and British Columbia reveal that these place-based organizations pivoted services and developed innovative strategies to meet changing rural needs. The findings highlight their commitment to building resilient communities and offer insights for strengthening philanthropic sustainability and rural recovery policy.
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Place-Based Economic Development as a Strategy for Rural Revitalization: An Assessment of Saskatchewan’s Policy Environment and the OECD’s New Rural Paradigm (1990—2024)
Saskatchewan's rural policy from 1990 to 2024 lacks a coherent place-based development strategy despite its potential for revitalizing struggling communities. The province relies on sector-specific, market-driven approaches managed through municipal revenue funds rather than integrated place-based policies aligned with OECD frameworks. Political considerations and failure to separate rural policy from other sectors have undermined effective rural revitalization efforts.
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Reframing Electricity Access in Rural Latin America: An Energy Justice Analysis
This paper analyzes electricity access in rural Latin America through an energy justice lens. The author examines how power systems are distributed and who benefits from energy infrastructure, revealing inequities in rural electrification. The work reframes electricity access beyond simple availability metrics to address fairness, participation, and control over energy resources in rural communities.
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Cybersecurity Vulnerabilities in Off-Grid Solar Systems: Implications for Energy Equity in Rural Communities
Off-grid solar systems in rural communities contain cybersecurity vulnerabilities that threaten energy equity by undermining accessibility, affordability, and reliability. The paper identifies specific vulnerable components and attack types, then argues that effective security solutions must be tailored to each community's unique context rather than applied universally. Context-appropriate approaches are essential to protect energy justice in rural electrification programs.
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How is RuralGoing Digital? Using Community-BasedResearch to Understand Rural Broadband Use
Rural Manitoba communities used community-based research to examine how they currently use broadband and digital technologies, and to identify future applications. The research shows that digital technologies can help rural areas overcome distance and density challenges, but communities must align technology adoption with their own development plans. Community-led research proved effective for exploring both current digital use and local opportunities.
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'It's like another world': Intra-Rural Digital Divides and Public Libraries as Rural Assets
Rural areas contain hidden digital divides within themselves that persist even as rural-urban gaps close. Ethnographic research in rural Appalachia reveals how intra-rural digital inequity operates across multiple dimensions. Public libraries emerge as key assets for addressing these internal divides and advancing digital equity within rural communities.
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Understanding the digital divide: Contributing factors and their negative effects on rural students’ academic performance
Rural students face significant academic disadvantages due to limited digital technology access. The digital divide reduces classroom participation, lowers achievement, and reinforces existing educational inequalities. The paper recommends governments and school leaders invest in technological infrastructure, provide teacher training, distribute devices equitably, and build digital literacy skills to close this gap.
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Bridging the Digital Divide: Community-Engaged Strategies for Implementing Technology in Rural Adult Day Centers
CareMobi, a mobile health app, was implemented in rural adult day centers to improve communication between staff and family caregivers of people with dementia. Community-engaged strategies—including collaborative design, staff training, and iterative adaptation—successfully addressed digital literacy gaps, infrastructure limits, and trust-building challenges. The app improved information-sharing and early identification of health changes, demonstrating that intentional engagement with frontline staff and caregivers enables sustainable technology adoption in under-resourced rural settings.
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Bridging the Digital Divide: Developing Tech Support for Rural Veterans to Improve Telehealth Access
Rural older Veterans face barriers to telehealth due to limited digital skills and poor infrastructure. The T-COACH program trains community volunteers to provide in-home technology education, helping Veterans access telehealth appointments. Implementation challenges include recruiting skilled rural volunteers, transportation constraints, and regulatory compliance. Success requires partnerships with local organizations, adequate resources, and sustainable funding to scale this approach.
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Effects of Digitalization on Cybersecurity of U.S Hospitals: The Roles of Urban-Rural Divide and Religious-Secular Mission
Hospital digitalization reduces cybersecurity breach risk, but the relationship is complex. Breach likelihood initially rises as hospitals digitalize, peaks at moderate levels, then declines at high digitalization. Urban and secular hospitals show higher peak risks and delayed improvements. Religious hospitals experience lower peak risks, particularly in rural areas. The findings show that governance and security investments must be sequenced strategically alongside digital maturity.
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Rural electromobility: innovation for transportation in indigenous and rural communities
Rural electromobility using light electric vehicles like tricycles and motorcycles can reduce transportation gaps in indigenous and rural communities in southeastern Mexico. The study of three states found that despite financing and maintenance challenges, electric vehicles offer emissions reductions, cost savings, and improved service access. Success requires participatory design, local technical training, and coordination with academic institutions.
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Enhancing Health Care Access in Rural and Remote Communities: An Environmental Scan of Virtual Health Innovations in British Columbia
British Columbia has implemented 70 virtual health innovations in rural and remote communities over the past decade, including Real Time Virtual Support pathways for emergency and maternity care. These initiatives operate largely in isolation across regions. The paper argues that stronger partnerships among policymakers, health authorities, researchers, industry, and communities are essential to integrate these efforts and improve healthcare access and equity in underserved areas.
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Primary Care Rural and Frontier Clinical Trials Innovation Center (PRaCTICe): Co-designing research with communities
PRaCTICe is a research initiative that engages rural primary care clinics and communities in co-designing studies aligned with local health priorities. The program uses regional engagement specialists, community needs assessments, listening sessions, and an advisory board to build lasting research infrastructure across rural networks in the Pacific Northwest. Year 1 results show successful clinic-specialist relationships, identified research needs, and community-prioritized health topics.
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Innovations in Rural Aging: Community-Based Approaches to Support Older Adults
Rural communities face distinct aging challenges requiring tailored solutions. This symposium presents five community-based interventions across U.S. regions: Indigenous healing methods improved care for Native American elders in South Dakota; culturally appropriate family solutions addressed caregiving gaps for Latinx families in New Mexico; low-tech healthcare tools supported rural Veterans with vision loss in Florida/Georgia; intergenerational programming promoted healthy aging in Oklahoma; and flexible community programs enhanced independence and quality of life for older adults in North Dakota. Community-informed approaches prove effective for rural aging.
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Place-Based Diminished Returns of Parental Education on Adolescents’ Inhalant Use in Rural Areas
Higher parental education typically protects adolescents from inhalant use, but this benefit disappears in rural areas. Using national survey data of 12th graders, the study finds that rural youth from highly educated families face disproportionately high inhalant use risk compared to urban and suburban peers. Geographic marginalization—limited jobs and recreation—undermines the protective effects of parental socioeconomic resources in rural settings.
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Academic Aspirations of 12th Grade Students in the United States: Place-Based Diminished Returns of Parental Education in Rural Areas
Higher parental education increases adolescents' aspirations for advanced education, but this benefit is significantly weaker in rural areas than urban or suburban settings. Rural students experience diminished returns on their parents' educational advantages, facing a dual disadvantage of lower socioeconomic resources and reduced benefits from those resources. Policymakers must implement targeted interventions to equalize educational opportunities across geographic contexts.
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Exploring How Rural Teachers’ Place Identity Relates to Place-Based Curriculum Implementation
Rural teachers' sense of connection to their local place shapes how they implement place-based education. Teachers who felt strongly connected to their community viewed local resources as valuable teaching tools, while those with weaker place identity saw the same resources as obstacles. The study of 17 rural teachers shows that personal place experiences directly influence whether educators can effectively use their surroundings for instruction.
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Navigating Rural: Place-Based Transit Solutions for Rural Canada | Parcourir Le Milieu Rural: Des Solutions de Transport en Commun en Milieu Rural Canadien
Rural Canada faces significant transportation challenges due to low population density and geographic dispersion. This paper examines place-based transit solutions tailored to rural communities' specific needs and contexts. The authors analyze how customized transportation approaches can improve mobility and connectivity in rural areas, supporting economic development and quality of life while accounting for local conditions and resources.
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Place-Based Rural Development: A Role for Complex Adaptive Assemblages?
Rural development programs often improve measurable indicators without making residents feel their lives have actually improved. Using ethnographic research in Cornwall and Southwest Virginia, this paper develops the concept of complex adaptive region assemblages to explain this gap. The author finds that revitalization systems work better when they strengthen connections between local residents and help them navigate their communities more effectively.
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Improving teacher retention in rural Alaska: an experiential place-based model
A partnership between the University of Alaska, Bristol Bay Foundation, and four rural school districts created a place-based experiential learning program to retain teachers in Alaska's Bristol Bay region. The program achieved a 95% teacher retention rate, far exceeding the regional average of 66%. The model connects educators with local culture and community, offering a replicable approach for rural districts facing persistent teacher turnover.
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Place-based rural development: building capacities, multi-actor collaborations and making sense of the local ‘place’
Place-based rural development succeeds when local actors collaborate and deliberately build capacity to connect external knowledge with local circumstances. A case study of Nova Scotia's wine industry shows how multi-actor collaboration and intentional interventions created a new industry from scratch in a region lacking initial endogenous capacity. The findings demonstrate that rural regions can develop entirely new industries through strategic knowledge recombination and coordinated capacity building.
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Stormwater Management Challenges in Rural Coastal Maine: Identifying Place-Based Solutions by Studying Current Practices
Rural coastal Maine communities face severe stormwater management challenges exposed by catastrophic 2023-2024 storms. Town officials lack formal data collection systems, mapping infrastructure, and adequate budgets, forcing reactive rather than proactive decision-making. The study identifies solutions including voluntary education, inter-town collaboration, culvert inventories, and system mapping to strengthen climate resilience and prevent costly infrastructure failures.
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Place-Based Strategies for Economic Resilience in Rural Northern Maine
Rural communities in northern Maine have adapted standard development tools to address their unique challenges following the closure of Loring Air Force Base. The research examines five interconnected development areas: housing and land use, broadband connectivity, industry recruitment, downtown revitalization, and adaptive tourism. Transportation emerges as a fundamental constraint shaping all development opportunities in these extremely rural contexts.
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Rural Teachers’ Experiences with a Place-Based Gifted Curriculum
Rural teachers implementing a place-based language arts curriculum for gifted students in an Appalachian school district faced significant barriers that prevented full curriculum delivery. The study of 16 elementary teachers across eight schools found that existing rural school challenges—including resource constraints and structural limitations—reduced student access to the gifted program. The findings highlight how rural context directly shapes curriculum implementation and student opportunity.
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Pathways to Higher Education: Expanding College and Career Access for Rural Youth
Utah State University Extension hosted a two-day event that brought 31 rural youth from two Utah counties to three campuses for immersive tours and workshops. Participants gained increased confidence about college, learned more about financial aid, and developed stronger interest in careers. The program successfully improved youth understanding of higher education pathways and their confidence in preparing for postsecondary education.
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Novel Dynamic Inverter Control Mechanism for Reliable Solar-PV Energy Access in Weak Rural Grids
Researchers developed a decentralized solar photovoltaic system for low-income rural communities with weak electrical grids. The 5 kW system uses novel control mechanisms to track maximum power output under changing sunlight and stabilize voltage during grid disturbances. It meets power quality standards and achieves over 96% efficiency, reducing dependence on diesel generators and centralized grids while providing reliable electricity for households and agriculture.
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PV + Battery Storage System Design for Off-Grid Rural Homesteads in Navajo-Based Indigenous Communities
This paper describes the design of an off-grid solar and battery storage system for Navajo Nation homesteads in the southwestern United States. The system—1.6 kW photovoltaic array with 10.2 kWh battery storage—was developed through direct community input to ensure cultural alignment. Implementation delivers energy sovereignty, resilience, cost savings from improved water and food access, and workforce development opportunities for indigenous families.
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Powering tomorrow’s farms: A roadmap for hydrogen energy systems in off-grid rural agricultural decarbonization
This paper develops a practical roadmap for implementing hydrogen energy systems on off-grid farms to reduce agricultural emissions. It compares hydrogen systems against renewable energy and diesel alternatives, examines costs and logistics of hydrogen transport, analyzes power electronics integration, explores hydrogen use in farm vehicles, and proposes a simplified system design to help farmers adopt the technology. The work targets researchers, engineers, and policymakers working on sustainable agriculture.
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Off the Grid: Rural Identity, Environmentalism, and Renewable Energy Policy in Rural New England
Rural New England residents with strong environmental values still oppose renewable energy development and land-use regulation at higher rates than urban counterparts. The study of 1,400 residents reveals that rural identity itself predicts lower policy support, even among environmentalists. Place attachment combined with resentment toward cultural displacement drives opposition. Opposition stems not from economic concerns alone, but from symbolic factors: identity, belonging, and desire for local autonomy.
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Beyond the City Limits: Analysis of Federal Funding of Public Transit in Rural Canada
Canada's Rural Transit Solutions Fund has shifted federal funding patterns and increased transit accessibility in some rural areas, but significant gaps persist. Smaller, remote, and Indigenous communities still face disparities in accessing federal support. The fund is changing who receives funding and where money flows, yet it has not fully aligned with rural transportation needs across the country.
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Michigan&#8217;s Rural Transit Enterprises and Their Attributes
Michigan's 57 rural transit agencies operate 5.6 million trips annually across 37,000 square miles, but face significant technology and connectivity barriers. A 2024 survey reassessed technology readiness levels among these agencies, examined rider demographics, funding mechanisms, and voter support. The study recommends strategic communication, technology adaptation, and user-centered design improvements, including a statewide Mobility-as-a-Service platform to enhance rural transit accessibility and efficiency.
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Kupuna transit hub – the case for the Waianae transit station: Addressing wellbeing, access, and mobility in rural areas of Oahu
This paper examines a proposed transit hub in Waianae, a rural area of Oahu, Hawaii. The project addresses transportation access and mobility challenges in rural communities while promoting wellbeing for kupuna (Hawaiian elders). The transit station design aims to improve connectivity and quality of life for residents in underserved rural areas.
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Regional Transit Authority Efforts to Support COA Transportation in Rural Areas in Massachusetts
A regional transit authority in Massachusetts deployed trip-booking software to improve transportation for older adults and people with disabilities across rural and urban areas. Dispatchers and directors valued automated rider information and digital reporting, though some technical issues persisted. Trip data showed modest increases in essential trips, but riders wanted more social and recreational options. Coordination across towns remains difficult due to varying COA operations and policies.
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Bridging tradition and innovation: strengthening food system resilience through Indigenous Guardian partnerships and knowledge sharing in the Sierra Nevada and British Columbia
Indigenous communities in California's Sierra Nevada and British Columbia strengthen food system resilience by combining traditional knowledge with modern tools. Through Guardian programs and participatory mapping, these communities restore stewardship of lands and waters while reclaiming data sovereignty. Elders transmit Indigenous knowledge through oral traditions and hands-on practice, enabling climate adaptation and food sovereignty. The study demonstrates that integrating Indigenous governance with emerging technologies creates resilient, culturally-grounded food systems.
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Correction: Bridging tradition and innovation: strengthening food system resilience through Indigenous Guardian partnerships and knowledge sharing in the Sierra Nevada and British Columbia
Indigenous Guardian partnerships in California's Sierra Nevada and British Columbia integrate traditional Indigenous knowledge—particularly cultural burning practices—with modern technologies to strengthen food system resilience and wildfire preparedness. The paper demonstrates that Indigenous-led stewardship enhances ecosystem restoration, community safety, and climate adaptation while advancing food sovereignty and supporting Indigenous land governance and cultural continuity.
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Tobacco Use, Experiences and Knowledge Among Indigenous Mexican Agricultural Workers
Indigenous Mexican agricultural workers in the United States show high tobacco use and secondhand smoke exposure, with significant knowledge gaps about tobacco's health risks. Recent immigrants speaking only Indigenous languages need prevention programs most, while longer-term residents with Spanish proficiency need cessation resources. Current tobacco control programs rarely reach this population, creating an urgent need for culturally and linguistically tailored interventions.
Media stories — 15
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From Estevan to Drayton Valley: How Rural Tech is Bridging Skills Gaps
Estevan's Southeast Tech Hub is sharing its innovation model with other rural communities, including Drayton Valley, to address digital skills gaps and youth out-migration. The hub's programs, particularly computer science training through Southeast College, connect young people with local industry problems while helping businesses adapt to technological change. The model demonstrates how rural communities can retain talent and support entrepreneurship through collaborative, community-driven initiatives.
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Needs Art: Reimagining Rural Innovation (Part 1)
Rural businesses receive less than 1% of venture capital despite representing 12% of U.S. firms, with funding concentrated in five major metros. Rural founders innovate at equal rates to urban peers when controlling for size and sector, but lack institutional support. AscendRural proposes place-based accelerators designed for rural realities, prioritizing local relationships and community-defined outcomes over urban-focused models.
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Part 1: Hands-On Telehealth Helps Reach Rural Texas Communities
A retrofitted shipping container in Fort Davis, Texas now houses a telehealth clinic staffed by a local nurse who takes vital signs and guides patients through remote appointments with distant specialists. This hybrid model addresses barriers rural aging populations face—unreliable broadband, digital literacy gaps, and provider shortages—by combining in-person support with virtual care access.
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Governor Newsom turns on largest public broadband network, California connects first rural community to internet
California activated the nation's largest public broadband network, connecting the Bishop Paiute Tribe as its first customer. The Middle-Mile Broadband Network delivers high-speed internet to rural and historically underserved communities across the state. The tribe will independently operate its broadband service, marking a major step toward closing the digital divide affecting 35% of rural Americans.
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Rural Broadband Coverage Has Many Solutions and Shortfalls
Rural broadband subscriptions jumped from 58% in 2018 to 71% by 2025, driven by nearly $47 billion in federal investment following the COVID-19 pandemic. Despite progress, challenges persist: inaccurate mapping slows expansion, some rural residents remain disconnected despite proximity to fiber lines, and adoption varies widely across regions. Multiple technologies—fiber, line-of-sight towers, satellite, and cellular—are filling gaps unevenly.
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Alaska's energy challenges demand microgrid, storage and national commitment
Alaska's isolated communities face unique energy challenges that differ fundamentally from the interconnected grid serving most of the United States. Over 200 communities operate disconnected microgrids with electricity costs several times the national average due to remote terrain, extreme weather, and small customer bases. The state's largest region depends on declining natural gas supplies and faces transmission constraints. Federal investment at scale is needed to support local generation, fuel supply, and grid modernization.
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Rural Innovation Hub takes root in Georgetown, Delaware
Delaware's Rural Innovation Hub opened in Georgetown in December, providing coworking and collaboration space for entrepreneurs, nonprofits, and remote workers in underserved Sussex County. The hub addresses a long-standing gap in infrastructure south of the Chesapeake & Delaware Canal, offering shared desks, offices, and meeting facilities to organizations historically clustered in northern Delaware.
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Innovation is part of rural America's DNA
Rural entrepreneurs across the United States are driving innovation in digital technology, affordable housing, and childcare. The Brookings podcast features founders building ventures to bring economic opportunity to small towns, including a digital development organization in Missouri, a bilingual childcare center in Maine, and housing initiatives in Colorado. Rural innovation remains underrecognized despite its significance to American economic strength.
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4 Digital Health Projects Transforming Care Delivery
Four digital health initiatives are expanding rural healthcare access across the United States. Projects include Rush University's direct-to-consumer telehealth membership service, University of Utah Health's TeleNICU connecting rural nurseries with neonatologists, New Mexico libraries installing soundproof telehealth booths funded by USDA grants, and a mobile medical unit with telehealth capabilities serving 40 West Virginia counties.
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Alliance to Advance Climate-Smart Agriculture receives extension, expands enrollment
A Virginia Tech-led initiative providing financial incentives and technical support to help farmers adopt climate-smart practices received a one-year extension through 2027 from the USDA. The $80 million program has enrolled 1,800 farms across 475,000 acres in four states since 2023. The extension enables continued enrollment, expanded livestock producer support, and comprehensive measurement of environmental and economic outcomes.
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Canada is expanding high-speed Internet access in Nunavut
Canada announced over $86 million in federal funding to bring unlimited high-speed Internet to 11,650 households across all 25 communities in Nunavut. The Universal Broadband Fund investment partners Northwestel with Telesat to deliver satellite-based connectivity using low Earth orbit technology, closing the digital divide in Canada's North and supporting access to healthcare, education, and economic opportunities.
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New Loan Program Targets Rural Innovators in Essex County and Chatham-Kent
WEtech Alliance, Community Futures Essex County, and Community Futures CK launched the Rural Growth & Commercialization Loan program, pairing flexible financing with commercialization support for innovation-driven companies in rural Essex County and Chatham-Kent. The program addresses a funding gap for rural businesses with proven products seeking to scale beyond their initial markets, offering capital for product development, market entry, and IP protection.
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Canada and Alberta are expanding high-speed Internet access in the province
Canada and Alberta announced $224.78 million in combined federal and provincial funding to bring high-speed Internet to over 82,500 households in rural and remote communities across Alberta, including 1,634 Indigenous households. The investment is part of a broader $780 million broadband partnership to achieve universal connectivity by 2030.
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Drones and Artificial Intelligence Leading Agricultural Innovation
USDA and Auburn University researchers are developing drone and AI technologies to transform agricultural operations across row crops, pastures, and specialty crops. The collaborative research focuses on improving material delivery systems, sensor capabilities, and autonomous navigation while testing practical applications like cover crop seeding, pest monitoring, and harvest timing to help Alabama farmers make better management decisions.
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Rural Impacts
Rural Southeast communities dependent on agriculture, fishing, and forestry face mounting climate risks including rising temperatures, drought, and sea-level rise that threaten crop yields, livestock health, and forest productivity. Heat stress endangers outdoor workers while energy-intensive facilities face resource constraints. Researchers develop climate-adapted crop varieties and livestock management strategies to help rural economies adapt to changing conditions.