Join Us

The Elahi Lab is hiring at all levels. To join us, email your CV and personal statement to the lab PI: fanny.elahi@mssm.edu.

How We Work

All lab members are expected to contribute to a positive, welcoming, and efficient environment. You will be challenged to ask important questions, be more rigorous and precise, acquire new skills, and seek to excel. We uphold our core values while conducting rigorous, patient-centered research that seeks to alleviate the burden of brain degenerative disease in the world.

Upholding Core Values

Our multidisciplinary approach operates at the intersection of clinical and preclinical research, and I expect all members to operate ethically and humanely with this important responsibility. Our ambitious, creative, and patient-centered projects will be conducted in the most rigorous manner possible, which includes excellent record keeping, active participation in project and group meetings, and assuring that all your data is organized, experiments are reproducible, and findings are validated through replication. All members are expected to dedicate time toward science dissemination in all forms - from our internal meetings, to scientific conferences, to public/patient education.

Above all else, I expect lab members to bring a team-first, collegial spirit to their interactions. We aim to proactively uphold a positive lab environment for all members at all times. This respect extends to all institutional support staff, as their support is essential to ensuring a safe, clean, and efficient environment that allows us to conduct our best work. You should be generous in your crediting of contributors who have shared ideas, information, and data.

Core values

Humanistic

Inclusive

Patient-centered

Team based

Authentic

Ambitious

Bold

Creative

Generous

What All Team Members Can Expect

  • You will be challenged to be more precise, rigorous, ask important questions, acquire new skills, and seek to excel

  • You will be asked to regularly assess your needs (hard and soft skills) and push yourself beyond your comfort zone and ask for help when you need it

  • You will draft an Individual Development Plan (IDP) and review it every 3 months with me

  • You will receive - and, ideally, welcome - regular feedback on ideas, experiments, writing, and presentations

  • You will continually engage in organizing your data, making figures, writing papers (and at times grants), and preparing presentations 

  • You will present your work at lab meetings and at least 1 national or international meeting per year

  • You will be included in new project developments, and be given the opportunity to develop your own project

  • You will receive scientific and career mentorship

  • Postdocs are expected to work on developing their fully independent project and a clear career path using a combination of the expertise they bring and my assistance. This will be possible through open and honest communication with me, both of your needs and concerns but also receiving regular feedback.

    At the end of your time in the lab, I expect that you will have refined your skills in dissemination of your science and have a clear understanding of the work you can take to start your own lab. Along with your scientific and career aspirations, I expect you, as senior members of the lab, to help me set the tone of collegiality and respect in our lab. 

  • As support staff I expect your enthusiasm and dedication to help run our lab smoothly and allow us to do the best research possible. I expect you to regularly assess the state of the lab and ensure that all members are doing their part to maintain the lab and complete their lab duties. I hope that by the end of your time in the lab you will be empowered to manage a laboratory with confidence.

  • Graduate students are expected to join the lab with enthusiasm and the desire to learn and refine their skills as scientists. I expect you to learn how to ask insightful questions and develop your own thesis project with my guidance. I expect that you will ask for help as you embark on your journey as a scientist and that you will accept honest and open feedback from me and other lab members. At the end of your time in the lab I expect that you will be confident in your ability to write and defend a thesis. 

  • As the face of our research study, it is your responsibility to convey our deep gratitude and core values to research participants. I expect you to be highly organized, efficient, and clear in all aspects of your work: interactions with participants, regulatory components of the study, as well as data collection, entry, and organization. I expect you to be an excellent communicator, maintaining clear and concise dialogue with participants and the rest of the team.

Mentorship commitment

I aim to help you reach your scientific and career goals. You should expect feedback - both positive and negative. We will have one-on-one meetings, as well as structured assessments. We will review and edit your IDP together to formalize your needs and goals and will review this every 3 months to ensure that we are on track.

I will regularly provide feedback on ideas, work, and experiments, as well as your skills in scientific communication and team work. I will address the order of authorship early in a project and re-evaluate this via open discussion as the project evolves.

Overall, you can count on me to support your professional development. You can expect me to meet success with celebration and failure with support.