Theresa Vu holds a B.S. Biological Sciences from University of California at Irvine. At her time there, she conducted research on epilepsy where she was second author on a paper published in eNeuro. After graduating, she worked as a Post-baccalaureate Intramural Research Training Award Fellow at the NIH observing Non-Human Primates when given an economic choice between remifentanil and nondrug rewards.