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Introduction: Capability is built upon knowledge and wisdom,<br />and scientific progress and development is associated with<br />wealth production, national and international authority, and<br />independence. To promote scientific development, as a prerequisite<br />to the country’s progress in other areas, there is a need for strategic<br />planning and creating scientific capacities. Today’s world is facing<br />a rapid growth and development in science and technology, and<br />universities and higher education centers have an important role<br />in the society’s development and progress in the areas of human<br />resources training, science and technology production, and<br />solving different problems. Considering the Iran’s health scientific<br />road map and communication of innovation and reform plans, and<br />since universities are required to identify the areas of authority,<br />this study was conducted to determine the challenges of scientific<br />authority promotion and proper courses of action.<br />Methods: In this study, content analysis was used as a qualitative<br />research method. The triangulation method was applied for data<br />collection. Purposive sampling was done to select the participants<br />for focused group discussion and data collection continued until<br />data saturation was achieved. The participants were 19 higher<br />education experts and MOHME policymakers. The ATLAS.ti<br />software version 5.2 was used for analysis of data.<br />Results: The results of the analysis of transcripts obtained from<br />FGD with higher education experts and MOHME policymakers<br />showed 4 themes, 10 categories and 43 sub-categories. The resulting<br />themes included: “Experienced perceptions of scientific authority”,<br />“Requirements of scientific authority”, “Challenges of scientific<br />authority”, and “Strategies for promoting scientific authority”.<br /> Conclusion: Universities and governmental sectors do not<br />represent all the capacities, and there are much more capacities<br />that can be exploited with participation of different sectors<br />and institutions, especially inter-sectoral and inter-university<br />collaborations. Many advances in new sciences have occurred<br />in interdisciplinary majors, and these collaborations help to take<br />solid steps towards scientific authority.