Indicator: Knowledge Weighted intensity Index

The weighted intensity index (WII) (total flow = inflow + outflow) helps determine whether a region is generally flow dependent or not. It is a measure of regional autarky / flow dependency. The average value of the index for all of a region’s analysed flows can be treated as that region’s overall flow de-pendency. Regions with high WII values are strongly dependent on interregional flows. On the other hand, those with low values are strongly autarkic and only slightly connected with other regions.
The knowledge basket is spatially very diversified. While the significance of patent flows is greatest in Germany and Switzerland and in individual regions of Scandinavia (e.g. Helsinki), student flows under the Erasmus program are important for regions located peripherally to the European core, e.g. in Fin-land, Estonia, and Spain. On the other hand, the importance of H2020 projects resembles a mosaic spatially. In other words, regions very "involved" in H2020 projects are adjacent to those in which this type of activity is of very little importance. This can be explained by the distribution of university centres with high potential for international cooperation. In general, the spatial distribution of regions with in-tense patent linkages corresponds to the core-periphery model, while for the H2020 and ERASMUS student exchanges the pattern is far more polycentric.
The synthetic indicator for the knowledge basket shows the leaders of individual flows, but because these leaders are located in different parts of Europe for different flows, the synthetic indicator shows mainly peripheral areas, where regions participate, or participate to a very small extent, in knowledge flows. These are, apart from the capital regions, regions in Poland, Czechia, Slovakia, Hungary, Croatia, Romania, and Bulgaria, but also in Greece and southern Italy, as well as Sardinia, Corsica, and the Bal-earic Islands, and single regions in central France and England. In the case of knowledge flows, the core of Europe is southern Germany and Switzerland, followed by the entire belt from central Italy through Germany, the Benelux countries, Denmark, Sweden, and Finland. It is characteristic that the group of regions with the strongest knowledge flows does not include the British regions, even those with the strongest university institutions of global renown. This should be interpreted as a lower willingness of these institutions to cooperate, or as a focus on non-European linkages.