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Previous studies investigating proximity and collaboration have not clarified personal elements, such as working or communication style. Here, we show that personal proximity-close similarity in terms of personal traits and behavioral patterns-substantially affects the whole life cycle of research collaborations. We conduct a multi-case study of Dutch nanotechnology researchers. We select our interviewees through a bibliometric analysis and focus on the most central Dutch nanotechnology researchers in the global network. Our results reveal that social proximity and temporary geographical proximity have indirect effects enabling potential partners to assess their personal proximity. Sufficient levels of personal proximity often make or break the deal, provided that partners' cognitive and organizational proximity-which are major drivers of research collaborations-suffice. Introducing personal proximity to analyze research collaborations puts previous findings on proximity dimensions' effect on collaboration in a new perspective. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Collaborations are particularly important for the development and deployment of technology. We analyse the influence of organizational, technological and geographical proximity on European nanotechnology collaborations with the help of a publication dataset and additional geographical information. While organizational proximity influences the output of collaborations only indirectly, geographical and technological proximity do so directly. Geographical proximity is most significant in statistical terms and technological proximity has the highest magnitude of effect. Consequently, the latter lends itself most for management and policy interventions, for example, by providing information on technological specialization of potential partners. Resumen Las colaboraciones son especialmente importantes para el desarrollo y el despliegue tecnológico. Se analiza la influencia de la proximidad organizacional, tecnológica y geográfica en colaboraciones europeas en nanotecnología, con la ayuda de un conjunto de datos publicados e información geográfica adicional. Si bien la proximidad organizacional influye en el resultado de las colaboraciones solo de manera indirecta, las proximidades geográfica y tecnológica influyen directamente. La proximidad geográfica es la más significativa en términos estadísticos y la proximidad tecnológica tiene la magnitud del efecto más elevada. Consecuentemente, esta última se presta más a las intervenciones de gestión y de políticas, por ejemplo, facilitando información sobre la especialización tecnológica de socios potenciales. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]