This volume contains papers based on presentations given at the Pan-American Advanced Studies Institute (PASI) on commutative algebra and its connections to geometry, which was held August 3-14, 2009, at the Universidade Federal de Pernambuco in Olinda, Brazil. The main goal of the program was to detail recent developments in commutative algebra and interactions with such areas as algebraic geometry, combinatorics and computer algebra. The articles in this volume concentrate on topics central to modern commutative algebra: the homological conjectures, problems in positive and mixed characteristic, tight closure and its interaction with birational geometry, integral dependence and blowup algebras, equisingularity theory, Hilbert functions and multiplicities, combinatorial commutative algebra, Grobner bases and computational algebra.