Gerda is a Scientist with more than 30 years’ experience. Presently, she is appointed as an Extra- Ordinary Lecturer at the University of Pretoria. She is also involved in consulting and contract work and is a Managing Editor for the Journal of Ethnopharmacology and the Journal of Herbal Medicine. She acted as the Scientific Innovation Leader for the Natural Product Group at CSIR Biosciences, her duties included Group administrative functions, leadership, mentoring, effective management of large projects. Gerda’s experience includes supervision and mentoring of Post Graduate students in the field of medicinal and indigenous plants of southern Africa, management and collaboration of projects with multi-disciplinary research teams at international and national research institutes, universities, government departments and private companies. The research projects were aimed at the discovery and development of drug / natural product leads from the biodiversity of South Africa; involved scientific investigation of medicinal plants, through interactions with owners of indigenous knowledge; purification, isolation and structure elucidation of active constituents from these plants in various therapeutic areas such as asthma, cancer, inflammation, benign prostatic hyperplasia, erectile dysfunction, oxidative stress, Alzheimer etc.