Dr. Cummins obtained her undergraduate degree from McGill University in Chemistry with a focus on biological and analytical chemistry.
 
In 2002, she completed her Ph.D. under the guidance of Dr. Leslie Z. Benet at the University of California San Francisco in Pharmaceutical Chemistry. Her studies focused on the interplay between P450s and drug transporters in intestinal drug metabolism.
 
She then took a Howard Hughes Medical Institute postdoctoral fellowship with Dr. David Mangelsdorf at the University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center in Dallas. There, Dr. Cummins used her expertise in P450s and analytical chemistry to help identify the first ligand for a nuclear receptor in C.elegans. At the same time, she identified a role for the liver X receptor alpha in modulating stress hormone production.
 
Currently, she continues to explore the roles of the liver X receptors and the glucocorticoid receptor in the context of cholesterol homeostasis and diabetes.