1. Maria Fitzgerald is a British neuroscientist who is a professor in the Department of Neuroscience at University College London.
12 Facts About Maria Fitzgerald
1. 2.
Maria Fitzgerald's father, Desmond Fitzgerald, was a major in the Irish Guards.
3.
Maria Fitzgerald's older brother, Edmund Valpy Fitzgerald, is an emeritus professor in the Oxford Department of International Development.
4.
Maria Fitzgerald was awarded a Bachelor of Arts degree in 1975 from the University of Oxford.
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Maria Fitzgerald trained in pain physiology and neuroscience with Bruce Lynn and Patrick David Wall at University College London, where she was awarded a PhD in 1978.
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Maria Fitzgerald was awarded her first research grant from the Medical Research Council in 1981, and her research has been continuously supported by the MRC ever since.
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Maria Fitzgerald was awarded a "new blood lectureship" in the Department of Anatomy at UCL in 1984 and is Professor of Developmental Neurobiology in the UCL Department of Neuroscience, Physiology and Pharmacology, and a member of UCL Neuroscience.
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Maria Fitzgerald's work has had a major impact on our understanding of how pain perception emerges in early life and how early pain experience can shape pain sensitivity for life.
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Maria Fitzgerald's research has changed clinical perception by showing that pain in infancy requires appropriate measurement and treatment and that it should be tailored to the developmental stage of the child.
10.
In recognition of her work Maria Fitzgerald was awarded the Jeffrey Lawson Award for Advocacy in Children's Pain Relief from the American Pain Society in 2011, the first basic scientist to have received this award.
11.
Maria Fitzgerald was elected a Fellow of the Academy of Medical Sciences in 2000 and a Fellow of the Royal Society in 2016.
12.
Maria Fitzgerald has been awarded honorary membership in the International Association for the Study of Pain, the British Pain Society, the International Society for Pediatric Pain and the Physiological Society A podcast describing her research career is available on the Pain Research Forum.