Gail Mandel is senior scientist at the Vollum Institute and a professor in the Department of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology at OHSU. A valley girl at heart, she received her Ph.D. in Immunology from the University of California, Los Angeles, four years after receiving her B.A. in Biology. Mandel did her postdoctoral training at UCLA and the University of California, San Diego. She was an instructor in the Department of Pathology at Harvard Medical School for two years before joining Molecular Medicine at Tufts-New England Medical Center. In 1989, Mandel was promoted to associate professor in the Department of Neurobiology & Behavior at Stony Brook University and advanced to the rank of distinguished professor before joining the Vollum Institute in 2006. She was an HHMI Investigator from 1997 to 2016.

Research in the Mandel Lab is focused on understanding how neuronal cell identity is established and maintained. Most recently, the lab uncovered a role for glia in inducing neuronal dysfunction in Rett Syndrome, one of the most common causes of mental retardation in young girls.