Capitalizing on Synergies: Critical Reflection on a Coordinated Agricultural Project.

Synergy is defined as the interaction of elements that when combined produce a total effect that is greater than the sum of the individual elements. We believe that our AFRI CAP was particularly effective in fostering creative synergies among the project participants and this lead to a highly productive and intellectually-stimulating research experience. Here we offer our perspectives and experience participating in a large, multidisciplinary agroecosystems research project. Our goal with this critical reflection is to identify the key factors and actors that we believe were responsible for cultivating our team’s success and in so doing stimulate others involved in such projects to actively foster similarly productive synergies. Such synergies will likely speed progress in addressing the grand challenges facing agriculture.