The paper discusses changes produced by the emergence of research infrastructures at European level, which affect the modes of knowledge production and the role of research organizations. The paper is based on evidences derived from the work done in the last five years in one Research infrastructure -RISIS, dealing with studies on Science, Technology and Innovation Policy (STI) funded under the EUFP7. We assume that RISIS contribute to methodological innovation and improvement of data collection and use. However, in line with what happen for other research infrastructures, it poses the challenge of new relationships between decision-makers and research communities and within research organizations based on attention spaces and organizational resources, which are likely to produce different effects.