ABSTRACT
This chapter covers best practices that one should follow in conducting international research collaborations, with a particular focus on collaborations in the biotechnology and pharmaceutical research areas. It provides an overview of the nature and benefits of research collaborations, and then considers problems that can arise and the best ways to deal with them. For the purposes of this chapter, a successful research collaboration is one that produces useful data in a timely manner. If the data are not useful or cannot be acquired in a reasonable period of time, then the collaboration is not likely to be considered successful in the biotech and pharmaceutical arenas. A research collaboration is based on a relationship in which both sides contribute something of value, but the two sides may make unequal contributions. For example, one side may provide a rare and valuable reagent for performing an experiment, with the other side generating the experimental data using that key reagent. One side may collect clinical samples from patients with a particular disorder, which are then analyzed by the collaborator looking for new biomarkers of the disease. Ideally, both sides in the collaboration will have some intellectual input into the design of the experiments, taking advantage of the expertise on both sides. A collaboration would not exist if one group merely decided to pay a second group to perform some scientific experiments. Instead, this arrangement would be categorized as a fee-forservice agreement, not a collaboration. Collaborations must also be distinguished from reagent supply. This can be defined as providing a reagent, clinical sample or other material for the primary reason of fulfilling a publishing requirement. Reagent supply has virtually become a requirement of all quality scientific journals. These journals require, as a condition of publishing your article, that you provide any unique reagents used in the experiments (those that could not otherwise be readily obtained in the marketplace) to outside investigators who may request them. This is an entirely reasonable rule, because scientific advancement is supported when other investigators are able to confirm your initial research findings.
