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Jabir Mohamed and Jastaran (Jasty) Singh are graduate students at the University of Toronto, and both became F1000 Specialists earlier this year. Here they share what they’ve been doing since then, and their plans for 2016!

If you’d like to become an F1000 Specialist yourself, and tell your own colleagues about F1000, you can sign up here.

 

How have you spread the word about F1000 at UofT?

Since we began in September, we have focused our attention on familiarizing ourselves with all F1000 services, especially F1000Workspace, and connecting with F1000 Faculty Members currently active at our institution. We decided on this approach for two reasons: 1) Knowing the ins and outs of the services would enable us to distinguish F1000 from other online publishing platforms; and 2) building a rapport with Faculty Members would allow us reach their collaborators, post docs, and graduate students. On that note, I think we’ve done a great job so far, but these are ongoing tasks – you can never learn too much, and with more than 140 FM and Associate FMs represented at our institution, there’s always someone to connect with!

What are you planning for 2016 regarding F1000 Specialist activities?

In 2016, we plan to actively grow the F1000 community at our institution, both in terms of users and Specialists. Meet ups will be plentiful in the new year, and we plan to hold them at different locations in order to reach a broader audience. Our institution is affiliated with many research hospitals and institutes, so we’re hoping to bring together new faces each time. One initiative that we’re really excited about is the F1000 Faculty Spotlight Series: thirty-second promotional videos to highlight the work of F1000 FMs and how they are using F1000 services. Stay tuned!

What are you currently working on in the lab?

Jabir: I study consciousness and in particular how consciousness becomes impaired in temporal lobe complex partial seizures. The hope is to identify the brain structures, circuits and activity patterns essential to temporal lobe seizures that impair consciousness.

Jasty: I focus on generating specific types of immune cells, called T-cells from human stem cells. In my studies, an understanding of the biology and development of human T-cells is key in hopes of enhancing immune-related therapies for HIV infection and cancer transplantation.