This article outlines a network approach to the study of technological change. We propose that new inventions reshape networks of interlinked technologies by shifting inventors' attention to or away from the knowledge on which those inventions build. Using this approach, we develop novel indexes of the extent to which a new invention consolidates or destabilizes existing technology streams. We apply these indexes in analyses of university research commercialization and find that, although federal research funding pushes campuses to create inventions that are more destabilizing, deeper commercial ties lead them to produce technologies that consolidate the status quo. By quantifying the effects that new technologies have on their predecessors, the indexes we propose allow patent-based studies of innovation to capture conceptually important phenomena that are not detectable with established measures. The measurement approach presented here offers empirical insights that support theoretical development in studies of innovation, entrepreneurship, technology strategy, science policy, and social network theory.

To characterize the nature of innovation, we draw on foundational theories of scientific and technological change 2,29,30 , which distinguish between two types of breakthroughs. First, some contributions improve existing streams of knowledge, and therefore consolidate the status

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members of the Comparative and Historical Methods and the Economic Sociology Workshops at the University of Michigan, and audiences at the American Sociological Association (Las Vegas, Nevada) and Society for the Advancement of Socio-Economics (Madrid) annual meetings for helpful feedback on previous drafts. Max Milstein provided excellent legal research assistance. All errors are our own.