Alaa El-Husseini did his undergraduate biochemistry training in Cairo. In 1997, he completed his Ph.D. in the Graduate Program in Neuroscience at the University of British Columbia, Vancouver, Canada, under the supervision Steven Vincent. He then worked with David S. Bredt at the University of California at San Francisco as a Canadian Institutes of Health Research (CIHR)-funded postdoctoral fellow. He is now an associate professor in the Department of Psychiatry and a member of the Brain Research Centre at the University of British Columbia. His research combines molecular and cellular approaches to examine the development and plasticity of synapses in the central nervous system. Alaa El-Husseini is a Michael Smith Foundation for Health Research (MSFHR) Senior cientist, and his research is funded by operating grants from CIHR, MSFHR, EJLB, High Q foundation, Neuroscience Canada and the National Alliance for Research on Schizophrenia and Depression.