Competitive project funding and dynamic complex networks: evidence from Projects of National Interest (PRIN)

This paper aims to study the collaboration among researchers in a specific Italian program funding, the Projects of National Interest (PRIN), which supports the academic research. The paper uses two approaches to study the dynamic complex networks: first it identifies the observed distribution of links among researchers in the four areas of interest (chemistry, physics, economics and sociology) through distribution models, then it uses a stochastic model to understand how the links change over time. The analysis is based on large and unique dataset on 4322 researchers from 98 universities and research institutes that have been selected for PRIN allocation from 2000 to 2011. The originality of this work is that we have studied a competitive funding schemes through dynamic network analysis techniques.