Zaineb Jewad Selim graduated from the Baghdad High School for Girls in 1968 and holds degrees from UCL and the Open University, and a PhD from Cambridge University. She retired as a reader in neuroscience at the University of Leeds in 2009 and has since devoted her time to researching the family archives on the art and lives of her parents Lorna and Jewad Selim, in conjunction with study of the art and history of modern and ancient Iraq.
Zaineb is co-editor and an author of the definitive Catalogue Raisonné (Paintings and Sculptures) of her father Jewad Selim, published by Skira in 2025. Other books on the lives and works of Lorna and Jewad Selim are in progress.