Carmen S. Maldonado-Vlaar is professor of neuroscience at the University of Puerto Rico-Río Piedras Campus (UPR-RP), where she has been a faculty member in the biology department for 27 years. Her scientific research is based on an ongoing interest to discover and characterize potential therapeutic cellular targets that are important in cocaine addiction treatment and other mental conditions.
During her research and academic career, she has successfully mentored dozens of undergraduate and graduate students from underrepresented minorities in the field of neuroscience. She has also taught numerous neuroscience courses at her institution at both levels.
Maldonado-Vlaar received her Ph.D. in behavioral neuroscience from Northeastern University under the mentorship of Ann E. Kelley. She continued with postdoctoral training in the neuropharmacology department at the Scripps Research Institute with George F. Koob.
Her work has been published in premier scientific journals, and she serves as a consulting editor for the journal Behavioral Neuroscience. At the UPR-RP, she served as institutional coordinator for the Leadership Alliance and for the Howard Hughes Medical Institute Gilliam Fellowship. She has extensive administrative experience as chair of the Department of Biology and as dean of Graduate Studies and Research. She has also devoted countless hours to mentoring neuroscientists at all career stages from diverse and disadvantaged backgrounds at the local and national level.
In her laboratory, Maldonado-Vlaar has mentored more than 100 Hispanic undergraduate students, of which more than 70 percent are women. She was principal and co-investigator of many training programs aimed at increasing access to careers in the neurosciences for women and members of underrepresented minorities. She established the first Center for Undergraduate Research and Learning (CRIIAS, by its Spanish acronym) at the UPR-RP and she is principal investigator of various institutional grants with significant impact.
In October 2020, Maldonado-Vlaar was the first Puerto Rican Latina neuroscientist to receive the Bernice Grafstein Award for Outstanding Accomplishments in Mentoring from the Society for Neuroscience. Since 2021, she has served as member of the society’s Professional Development Committee and is currently chair of the Neuroscience Scholar Program Subcommittee. In 2024, she was awarded, with her institution, the National Institutes of Health’s Institutional Excellence in Diversity, Equity, Inclusion,and Accessibility (DEIA) in Biomedical and Behavioral Research Prize for her outstanding work in the training of undergraduate students in the neurosciences at the UPR-RP. She also was featured as one of the Latina neuroscientists in the Atlas of Inspiring Hispanic/Latinx Scientists, featuring 385 outstanding Latinx scientists across the United States.
