2019-2020 Live Chat #4 - Collaborations with International Partners & Funders (2015 Alum)

[Stephanie Vose]

Join @Marcos Aranda, PhD, a 2015 LATP Fellow, in a discussion about Collaborations with International Partners and Funders. This live chat will take place on the LATP Community page on Monday, March 23 from 11:00a.m. to 12:00p.m. EST. Feel free to start leaving your comments and questions below!

About Dr. Aranda

Marcos Aranda is a Biologist and PhD in Neurosciences from University of Buenos Aires, Argentina. Currently, he is a post-doctoral fellow at Schmidt Lab in Northwestern University, IL, USA. He is interested in studying how light influences physiology using mouse genetics, electrophysiology and tracing neural circuits that underlies light-dependent behaviors. 

As a result of attending to the LATP in 2015 in Mexico, he joined in 2018 at the Brain Connectivity Laboratory (headed by Dr. Luis Concha), Universidad Autónoma de México, with which he maintains an active collaboration to this day. Dr. Aranda will share his personal experience and discuss the importance of forming Collaborations with International Partners.

Can't attend this chat live? That's OK! You can start the conversation by adding your questions/comments now or continue the conversation later by adding your questions/comments afterwards! 

Conversation Starters:

• What international collaborations are you interested in? 
• How to research and reach out to international partners and funders 
• Networking opportunities at international conferences (SfN annual meetings) 
• Collaboration challenges with international partners and funders 

[Marcos Aranda]

Hi everyone! I hope I can share my experience with collaboration groups and we can all discuss / comment on the different topics that arise in this chat!

[KathiaRamirez]

Hi Marcos,  I'm Kathia Ramírez from Mexico City.  Thanks for being here!

[Manuel Giraldo Velasquez]

Hi Marcos!!!!

[Fernando Castillo Diaz]

Good afternoon Marcos! and to everyone!

[Manuel Giraldo Velasquez]

I am Manuel from Mexico city too.

[Julian Naizaque]

Hello Marcos! Thanks to be here with us, sharing your experiences. I'm Julian Naizaque from Bogota, Colombia.

[Larissa Nascimento]

Hi Marcos,  I'm Larissa, from Brazil.  Thanks for being here! 

[Marcos Aranda]

Tank you guys for being here!

[Stephanie Vose]

6 minutes ago, Marcos Aranda said:

Hi everyone! I hope I can share my experience with collaboration groups and we can all discuss / comment on the different topics that arise in this chat!

Hi Marcos! Please feel free to start with an introductory statement about yourself and why this topic is important to you 

[Marcos Aranda]

In 2015, I attended to the LATP course at the Instituto de Nurobiologia, UNAM, Queretaro, Mexico. The course was really very enriching in many ways! In addition to gaining valuable experience, I met Dr. Concha (who was one of the teachers on the course). His research group in interested in using quantitative MRI, particularly diffusion-weighted MRI, for the study of neurological disorders. At that time, I was developing  model of neuroinflammation of the optic nerve. When I told him about my work, he thought that it was a good model to use in his research projects. Three years later, Dr. Concha obtained financing and I moved to Mexico for a 6-month stay in his laboratory and I worked in many projects involved in my and their research.

 

Edited March 23, 2020 by Marcos Aranda

[Fernando Castillo Diaz]

Wow really impresive! So how did you get the financial support to go there to work? Did you get it by yourself? Or did they give it to you financial support?

[Marcos Aranda]

1 minute ago, Fernando Castillo Diaz said:

Wow really impresive! So how did you get the financial support to go there to work? Did you get it by yourself? Or did they give it to you financial support?

Thanks you for the question Fernando! In my experience, the collaborating laboratory was the one that got the financing for me to travel. In any case, there are different types of scholarships for stays abroad that can be financed by national organizations (in Argentina, BECAR fellowships, for example the Ministry of Education), by SfN, IBRO, FENS; and others that can be granted by the destination countries (for example Fulbright, in the case of the USA https://us.fulbrightonline.org/).

Are any of you interested in doing an international collaboration?

[Julian Naizaque]

Marcos, how did you manage that time (6 months) to develop their project and your project?

[KathiaRamirez]

Wow, I think that you achieved one of the most important goals of the LATP Live Course, expand your networking.   Any advice to start the conversation, how is it the best approach to do it?

[Marangelie Criado Marrero]

HI Marcos, that sounds like a great opportunity. Did you work with your mentor on your research plan before joining the lab? 

[Fernando Castillo Diaz]

2 minutes ago, Marcos Aranda said:

Thanks you for the question Fernando! In my experience, the collaborating laboratory was the one that got the financing for me to travel. In any case, there are different types of scholarships for stays abroad that can be financed by national organizations (in Argentina, BECAR fellowships, for example the Ministry of Education), by SfN, IBRO, FENS; and others that can be granted by the destination countries (for example Fulbright, in the case of the USA https://us.fulbrightonline.org/).

Are any of you interested in doing an international collaboration?

Well, I am currently doing a postdoc in Italy, but I was wondering if starting a new collaboration could get me the opportunity to work after in a different lab and get a second postdoc. You know, perhaps a collaboration could be a "trigger" to start a new project with a another group.

[Marcos Aranda]

1 minute ago, Julian Naizaque said:

Marcos, how did you manage that time (6 months) to develop their project and your project?

Hi Julian, we were planning the experiments before my travel and we were sure that we had all the instruments/supplies to develop both projects. Of course, unpredictable things were coming up that delayed and diverged projects along the way. Which was even more enriching. In addition, the results that we were obtaining during my stay generated new projects that we continued at a distance.

 

[Priscila Chiavellini]

Hello Marcos!

I would like to know if yo first finished your phd and then moved to Mexico or if it was part of your phd training.

[Manuel Giraldo Velasquez]

Can you tell us a little bit about your project in Mexico?

[Marcos Aranda]

5 minutes ago, KathiaRamirez said:

Wow, I think that you achieved one of the most important goals of the LATP Live Course, expand your networking.   Any advice to start the conversation, how is it the best approach to do it?

Yeah, it was definitely like that! I think the best way is to share your own experiences and lines of research so that they are discussed with those of others. In this way, points of interest and possible future collaborations will emerge. (like what we are doing now :))

[Marcos Aranda]

6 minutes ago, Marangelie Criado Marrero said:

HI Marcos, that sounds like a great opportunity. Did you work with your mentor on your research plan before joining the lab? 

Yes, in my opinion, I think it is essential that these types of collaborative projects should be discussed in each of the collaborative groups that are part of the project separately (in lab meetings or meeting with your mentor) and by previous video calls between the parts.

 

[Marcos Aranda]

6 minutes ago, Fernando Castillo Diaz said:

Well, I am currently doing a postdoc in Italy, but I was wondering if starting a new collaboration could get me the opportunity to work after in a different lab and get a second postdoc. You know, perhaps a collaboration could be a "trigger" to start a new project with a another group.

Completely agree with you Fernando, don't loose the opportunity to establish / look for new collaboration. Discuss and find people that complement our research is healthy for sciences in general!

[Marcos Aranda]

6 minutes ago, Priscila Chiavellini said:

Hello Marcos!

I would like to know if yo first finished your phd and then moved to Mexico or if it was part of your phd training.

Good question. It was a part of my PhD training (the last quarter). I wrote part of my thesis in Mexico that was presented in Argentina 4 months after that.

[Julian Naizaque]

Marcos! In our lab we´re interested in getting an international fund so I'd like to ask you: To get an international fund, what must first: find a collaborator or find a specific fund?   

[Isis Nem De Oliveira Souza]

Hey, Marcos! I'm Isis from Brazil. Thanks for sharing your experience with us!

Any tips on convincing a resistant advisor that a specific collaboration could be good?

[Marcos Aranda]

8 minutes ago, Manuel Giraldo Velasquez said:

Can you tell us a little bit about your project in Mexico?

Yes, of course. My PhD was developing a new model of a disease named Optic Neuritis, which the the main neurodegenerative disease that causes blindness in young adults. To do this, LPS is injected into the optic nerve. This model causes inflammation and neurodegeneration of axons coming from the retina in a 21 d time window. In 2015, Dr. Concha became interested in this model, because the optic nerve has a 'friendly' anatomical condition to study diffusion-sensitive images on MRI. Since it takes a lot of training to inject the optic nerve (and I had been doing it a few years ago), Dr. Concha suggested that I go to Mexico, do the surgeries, and teach his students. For my part, I was interested in studying functional MRI as the model affected the activation of different areas of the brain. To do this, I built a light source (I also learned to program in ARDUINO) and by giving visual stimuli to anesthetized rats, we could see how different brain structures were activated differentially.

[Marcos Aranda]

8 minutes ago, Julian Naizaque said:

Marcos! In our lab we´re interested in getting an international fund so I'd like to ask you: To get an international fund, what must first: find a collaborator or find a specific fund?   

Julian, I'll give you my opinion, but I don't have much experience in this particular topic. I think that depends on your particular project. As far as I know, in projects that are related to neurodegenerative diseases (for example, related to translational studies) the sources of financing are more abundant than the rest of the areas. Probably if your area of study is part of a field more considered as 'basic science', perhaps it is more convenient to look for a collaborator.

[Marcos Aranda]

10 minutes ago, Isis Nem De Oliveira Souza said:

Hey, Marcos! I'm Isis from Brazil. Thanks for sharing your experience with us!

Any tips on convincing a resistant advisor that a specific collaboration could be good?

Good question! Honestly in my experience that did not happen. I think there are several reasons why some advisor are resistant to collaborations: perhaps due to concerns about the time it will take you to stay in the collaborating laboratory and this will be conceived as a 'bad investment' time; Or perhaps because of the thought that you have sufficient financing to carry out your project and you do not need to leave your laboratory.
I think a good option is to discuss / ask about the benefits of collaborating beyond those issues related to time / money.

What do you think?

[Marcos Aranda]

Guys, let me know if you have any additional question. Or if you want to share your experiences / opinion / comments!

[Stephanie Vose]

Just now, Marcos Aranda said:

Guys, let me know if you have any additional question. Or if you want to share your experiences / opinion / comments!

Thanks, Marcos! Our time is up so this live chat is officially over. Please feel free to revisit the thread and continue the conversation! 

[Fernando Castillo Diaz]

1 minute ago, Marcos Aranda said:

Guys, let me know if you have any additional question. Or if you want to share your experiences / opinion / comments!

So, were there any publications after your collaboration? If so, what was your author contribution in those works? Do you think it is important to clarify this before doing the collaboration to prevent missunderstandings in the future?

[KathiaRamirez]

9 minutes ago, Marcos Aranda said:

Good question! Honestly in my experience that did not happen. I think there are several reasons why some advisor are resistant to collaborations: perhaps due to concerns about the time it will take you to stay in the collaborating laboratory and this will be conceived as a 'bad investment' time; Or perhaps because of the thought that you have sufficient financing to carry out your project and you do not need to leave your laboratory.
I think a good option is to discuss / ask about the benefits of collaborating beyond those issues related to time / money.

What do you think?

Thanks Marcos, I agree with you about the concerns about the 'bad investment' time. It is time to us to open the conversation and, as you said, discuss abour the benefits beyond time/money issues. 

Edited March 23, 2020 by KathiaRamirez

[Marcos Aranda]

2 minutes ago, Fernando Castillo Diaz said:

So, were there any publications after your collaboration? If so, what was your author contribution in those works? Do you think it is important to clarify this before doing the collaboration to prevent missunderstandings in the future?

It is an excellent question Fernando, and it has as many answers as there are collaborators :). It is very variable, and I think that a good practice is that it is agreed in advance. The roles to be played by all parties may be established by who gets the funding, who had the question / idea, and the 'amount of work' each of the authors did.

[Ramiro Tintorelli]

Hi marcos, your experience is very interesting! Regarding that, I wanted to ask you if there is something in particular that you learned during the collaboration that later served you in what you are currently doing. Maybe it could be something not strictly scientific.

[Fernando Castillo Diaz]

Just now, Marcos Aranda said:

It is an excellent question Fernando, and it has as many answers as there are collaborators :). It is very variable, and I think that a good practice is that it is agreed in advance. The roles to be played by all parties may be established by who gets the funding, who had the question / idea, and the 'amount of work' each of the authors did.

All right, I will definetely consider all this in the future, thank you for your answers! 

[Marcos Aranda]

4 minutes ago, Ramiro Tintorelli said:

Hi marcos, your experience is very interesting! Regarding that, I wanted to ask you if there is something in particular that you learned during the collaboration that later served you in what you are currently doing. Maybe it could be something not strictly scientific.

Hi Ramiro, I am not currently working on projects that include the skills that I learned in my collaboration period. But I am sure that they will be taken into account and will be part of my tool box for when I advance in my scientific career. Beyond the experience gained as a scientific researcher, I believe that working in areas other than the usual ones enrich the personal capacity to discuss and share your work.

[Julian Naizaque]

Marcos! I'd like to ask you two things:

1) What would you suggest to someone who wants to do a stay during his/her PhD? Is the trainning in a specific technique the unique motivation?

2) Didyou change the topic of your research after/before to start your PhD? What could you comment about it? 

 

Thanks for sharing your time! 

[Ricardo Augusto Leoni de Sousa]

Hi, Marcos... how are you? I am Ricardo and I am writing to you from Brazil. I am just curious ... you told us that you are in Italy right now. Before you were in Mexico.  You did your Ph.D in Argentina. I know that you were  probably born in Argentina and for this reason you speak  spanish and english, but as you might have done your Ph.D in Argentina and be borned somewhere else, i will ask you... Do you speak italian and spanish or everybody speaks a fluent English in the labs where you were / are? In case not everybody had a fluent english, how was the communication ??? And finally, if you did not speak a fluent spanish or italian ... did you get time to learn or improve these languages??? 

 

It would be interesting to me these informations because i speak portuguese, english, spanish and italian, but i was in touch a few months ago with some advisors in france, but i do not speak french. i am in the second year of a post-doc here in brazil. thanks for your time and your explanations

Edited March 23, 2020 by Ricardo De Sousa
to be more specific

[Maria A. González-González]

Exciting experience, networking is very important and being LATFellow allowed you to open doors for research projects. Awesome

[Marcos Aranda]

A growing suite of tools allows teams of researchers to work collectively to edit scientific documents -> https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-020-00916-6

 

[Marcos Aranda]

On 3/23/2020 at 11:36 AM, Julian Naizaque said:

Marcos! I'd like to ask you two things:

1) What would you suggest to someone who wants to do a stay during his/her PhD? Is the trainning in a specific technique the unique motivation?

2) Didyou change the topic of your research after/before to start your PhD? What could you comment about it? 

 

Thanks for sharing your time! 

Hi Julian, sorry the delay in the response.

[Marcos Aranda]

Just now, Marcos Aranda said:

Hi Julian, sorry the delay in the response.

 I would suggest that you do the collaboration as much as possible, as long as the conditions are in place (of recursso and necessary time that allows you to carry out a fruitful work in the stay). The motive for doing so may be due to learning a new technique (as you say), or also that the host laboratory has different resources than your original laboratory. Or much better for both parties: that you also bring a new technique to the host laboratory.

[Marcos Aranda]

On 3/23/2020 at 11:44 AM, Ricardo De Sousa said:

Hi, Marcos... how are you? I am Ricardo and I am writing to you from Brazil. I am just curious ... you told us that you are in Italy right now. Before you were in Mexico.  You did your Ph.D in Argentina. I know that you were  probably born in Argentina and for this reason you speak  spanish and english, but as you might have done your Ph.D in Argentina and be borned somewhere else, i will ask you... Do you speak italian and spanish or everybody speaks a fluent English in the labs where you were / are? In case not everybody had a fluent english, how was the communication ??? And finally, if you did not speak a fluent spanish or italian ... did you get time to learn or improve these languages??? 

 

It would be interesting to me these informations because i speak portuguese, english, spanish and italian, but i was in touch a few months ago with some advisors in france, but i do not speak french. i am in the second year of a post-doc here in brazil. thanks for your time and your explanations

Hi Ricardo, sorry about the delay in my response. No, I just speak Spanish and English (woww portuguese, english, spanish and italian!!!). Best

[Julian Naizaque]

On 5/20/2020 at 8:56 AM, Marcos Aranda said:

 I would suggest that you do the collaboration as much as possible, as long as the conditions are in place (of recursso and necessary time that allows you to carry out a fruitful work in the stay). The motive for doing so may be due to learning a new technique (as you say), or also that the host laboratory has different resources than your original laboratory. Or much better for both parties: that you also bring a new technique to the host laboratory.

No problem. Thanks a lot Marcos for your answers and your time!