Dr. Pamela Maher received her BSc in biochemistry from McGill University in Montreal, Canada and her Ph.D., also in biochemistry, from the University of British Columbia, Vancouver, Canada. She was a postdoctoral fellow in the laboratory of Dr. Jon Singer at the University of California at San Diego where she studied cytoskeletal dynamics and cell signaling. She worked for 5 years as an assistant professor at the Whittier Institute for Diabetes and Endocrinology in La Jolla, CA and then moved to The Scripps Research Institute, also in La Jolla, in 1994 as an associate professor. In 2004, she moved to her current position at The Salk Institute. Her research interests are centered on understanding the responses of nerve cells to oxidative stress and how chemical compounds can modulate those responses in order to enhance nerve cell function and survival. Her current research is focused on using natural products such as  flavonoids, small molecules that are widely distributed in fruits and vegetables, to maintain nerve cell function in the presence of toxic insults.