Pangkong lives in Southeastern Wisconsin with her two kids and husband. Her youngest son was diagnosed with a CACNA1A-related disorder in December of 2021. Until then, the doctors and specialists her son had seen for years could not pinpoint an underlying cause for his ataxia and global developmental delays. However, a tentative diagnosis of left-hemiparesis eventually led to genetic screening of the cerebral palsy gene panel and the discovery of his CACNA1A variant. Pangkong set out to learn as much as she could about this rare condition and found the CACNA1A Foundation and its amazing team. She is honored, excited, and motivated to use her experience as a scientist, educator, and parent of a child with a CACNA1A variant, to connect the CACNA1A research world with the CACNA1A patients and families. She is a proponent of "conversational science" and her goal is to provide families with the support and resources to comfortably talk about CACNA1A to anyone who asks and to help bring awareness to this rare disease. She is also ready to help the board and research collaborators continue to drive the translational research needed to find treatments for CACNA1A patients on the pathway to a cure.

Pangkong received her Bachelor's Degree in Biology from the University of Wisconsin-Madison and her PhD in Cell & Molecular Biology from Indiana University. She continued her postdoctoral research at Northwestern University and has taught at Northern Illinois University, Kishwaukee College, and Aurora University. She had the opportunity to be a stay-at-home mom to care for both of her kids for the past few years before joining the Foundation's team.

Pangkong@cacna1a.org