1. promote multidisciplinarity throughout the research career
Multidisciplinary activities are not appreciated for their just value either at the time of recruitment or during evaluations throughout a researcher’s career. It is most important to ask questions in this respect, for example, when defining posts requiring interdisciplinary interaction (see Mathematics in the real world, Emerging mathematics and Numerical mathematics) and when choosing members for selection or expert committees so that multidisciplinary activities can be taken into account throughout a research career and during AERES assessments. It is therefore important to give priority to the creation of posts financed by Institutes where candidatures are eligible if, and only if, the work entails real interaction with other disciplines, and to increase the number of really multidisciplinary laboratories classified in more than one CNRS section, such as the GREMAQ in Toulouse where mathematicians mix with economists.
2. create engineers’ posts shared between two teams
The engineer will make the link between a mathematics team and a team from another discipline working on MPE topics. The engineer will help promote and exploit research results, and will work to improve the distribution of information, methods and their use. He or she will also work on the development of generic tools and data accessibility.
3. establish a quota of MPE bi-disciplinary thesis grants
These grants must be able to finance a thesis in its entirety. The doctoral student will be integrated in a collaborative MPE project and will be supervised by a teacher-researcher or researcher in mathematics and a teacher-researcher or researcher from another discipline.
4. training in numerical analysis from the Bachelor’s Degree
Since computing engineers are a rare commodity, it is important that students have at least the bases in numerical computation and information technology. For more specific needs in computational science, they will later have access to training in the doctoral schools and training centres.