Three Jamia Millia PhD students win US postdoctoral fellowships

Jamia Millia Islamia (JMI) on Thursday announced that three of its PhD students—Dr. Md Iqbal Azmi, Dr. Saleem Anwar, and Dr. Khursheed Ul Islam—have won highly coveted postdoctoral positions in the United States recently.

The students carried out their doctoral research under the guidance of Dr. Jawed Iqbal at the Multidisciplinary Centre for Advanced Research and Studies (MCARS), JMI.

Dr. Md Iqbal Azmi, recipient of the ICMR Senior Research Fellowship (SRF) and the TNQ Inspiring Science Award-2022, is known for his revolutionary creation of a CRISPR-based COVID-19 diagnostics technology during his PhD. He is now doing postdoctoral research at the University of Rochester, New York.

Dr. Saleem Anwar, also an ICMR-SRF fellow, received the Best Oral Presentation Award at a conference organized by the Department of Biosciences, JMI. He has now joined the Emory University School of Medicine, Atlanta, Georgia, as a Postdoctoral Fellow.

Dr. Khursheed Ul Islam, another PhD scholar from the same laboratory, has also commenced his postdoctoral research at the University of Rochester, New York.

All three researchers were offered postdoctoral positions soon after the successful defense of their doctorates and arrived at their respective institutions within three months. Their success testifies to the remarkable mentorship of Dr. Jawed Iqbal and the quality of research produced at his lab.

Dr. Iqbal, who is a member of MCARS since July 2017, has been instrumental in the academic and research development of the centre. Besides supervising PhD students, he has also guided many master's students. Among them, Ms. Fatemah Rizvi (M.Sc. Virology) received the coveted Reliance Foundation Postgraduate Scholarship, and Ms. Adila Khanam was awarded the prestigious Princeton Foundation Scholarship Award, USA.

Numerous other students at the master's level worked under Dr. Iqbal who have gone on to take admission in reputable national and global institutions to advance to further higher education and research avenues.

Three grants from the Department of Biotechnology (DBT), Science and Engineering Research Board (SERB), and the Department of Science and Technology (DST), together amounting to Rs 2.36 crore, presently fund Dr. Iqbal's research.