Lessons for Science from the "Year without a Summer" of 1816. What does it take for science to respond to climate change?

Science is responding in manifold ways to current climate change. What are the perquisites for response, and how can we structure the response? By studying the historical climatic event “Year without a Summer” of 1816 and by relating to Fleck’s theory of genesis and development of a scientific fact, we posit that responding refers to making interlinkages between different notions of climatic change.

Best practice in transdisciplinary research - Swiss td-award Winners 2013

Transdisciplinary research plays an increasing role in topics of societal relevance and impact. The td-net of the Swiss Academies of Arts and Sciences awards innovative transdisciplinary research every other year. The last td-award was given in 2013. This special focus of GAIA features the six prize-winning projects, presenting short summaries of their work. Explaining its selection in the following introduction, the Jury of the td-net honours the awardees, and puts their work into a global perspective.

Kommunikationskompetenz: Eine Bedingung für erfolgreichen Wissensaustausch

Um Umweltprobleme zu lösen, müssen meist voneinader abgegrenzte Wissenssysteme verbunden werden. Unterstützend wirkt ein funktionierender Wissensaustausch zwischen Forschung, öffentlicher Verwaltung und Praxis. Spezifische Kompetenzen helfen, Wissensaustauschprozesse erfolgreich zu gestalten: Kommunikationskompetenz ist eine davon.