Global environmental challenges are increasingly complex and interdependent and the sentiment that sustainability requires new approaches to integrating science and policy is ubiquitous. This is the domain of sustainability science. Yet, major gaps exist in our understanding of the relationships between researchers from different disciplines and between science, policy, and management. While scientific research is shifting toward greater collaboration and transdisciplinarity, we need to improve our understanding of the processes and structures that lead to successful scientific collaboration and high-impact, innovative science-policy outcomes. ‘Networks and networking’ offer a powerful strategy for integration in sustainability science, yet empirical research assessing network-based integration is limited. Using social network analysis, we empirically investigate the integration of the Texas Water Research Network (TWRN), which comprises academic and non-academic participants from multiple universities, disciplines and research orientations seeking to address the challenges posed by complex, multilevel water resource issues across the state of Texas. We found that TWRN members were relatively well connected (an average of 3.8 ties per member), but that some research groups (e.g. water science) were way more active and connected than others (e.g. scenario building). Within the different phases of the research process, bringing results to fruition was the most transdisciplinary. Utilizing analytical methods from network science can offer techniques to analyze and evaluate, as well as prescribe interventions and enable action in transdiciplinary research networks.

全球环境挑战日益复杂和相互依存，人们普遍认为，可持续性需要采用新方法来整合科学与政策。这是可持续发展科学的领域。但是，在我们对不同学科的研究人员之间的关系以及科学，政策和管理之间的关系的理解上存在重大差距。当科学研究正在朝着更大的合作和跨学科方向发展时，我们需要加深对导致成功的科学合作和高影响力的创新性科学政策成果的过程和结构的理解。“网络和网络”为可持续性科学的集成提供了强大的策略，但是评估基于网络的集成的实证研究有限。使用社交网络分析，我们以经验为基础，研究了德克萨斯水研究网络（TWRN）的整合，该网络由来自多所大学，学科和研究方向的学术和非学术参与者组成，旨在应对德克萨斯州各地复杂多层次的水资源问题带来的挑战。我们发现TWRN成员之间的联系相对良好（每个成员平均3.8个联系），但是某些研究小组（例如水科学）的活跃度和联系度比其他研究小组（例如情景构建）更为活跃。在研究过程的不同阶段，实现结果是最跨学科的。利用网络科学中的分析方法可以提供分析和评估技术，并规定干预措施并在跨学科研究网络中采取行动。