Amy Palmer received her B.A. in Chemistry from Dartmouth College in 1994, an M.A. in Education from Stanford University in 2000, and a PhD in Chemistry from Stanford University in 2001 where she worked with Professor Edward Solomon on the electronic structure of multicopper oxidases. From 2001-2005, Dr. Palmer was an NIH-postdoctoral fellow in the lab of Nobel laureate Roger Y. Tsien at UCSD. She is currently a Professor in the Department of Biochemistry and BioFrontiers Institute, where she has been since 2005. The Palmer lab develops new technologies to study the biochemistry of living cells to understand how specific proteins, molecules, and ions contribute to cellular function. The Palmer Lab applies these tools to study fundamental biochemical processes through the lens of metal ions such as zinc and to track RNA in living cells.  Professor Palmer is the recipient of a Sloan Foundation Research Fellowship (2010, Chemistry), NSF CAREER award (2010), Ed Stiefel Young Investigator Award in Biological Inorganic Chemistry (2010), NIH Director’s Pioneer Award (2014), Chancellor’s Award for Teaching Excellence (2016), Beckman Center Award for Light Sheet Microscopy and Data Science (2021), Cogswell Award for Inspirational Teaching (2024).