Academic discipline: Innovation policy, systems engineering, evolutionary economics, complexity science, data science, operations research 

Methods: Graph theory, citation networks, tech mining, machine learning 

Research question: How and why do technologies emerge in the long term? 

Description: New technologies emerge when science and existing technologies are applied to fulfill industrial objectives. Given the nonlinearity across research, development, production, and deployment, one knowledge gap is the manner in which different streams of knowledge evolve, combine, or diverge into different technological endpoints. Another lapse is datasets and models that describe the diffusion and translation of innovation. 

Implications: Elucidation of these patterns could diagnose the maturity of emerging technologies and signpost RD&D support according to technological maturities and complementarities.