Draft:Melanie Woodin

Melanie Woodin is a Canadian academic and Dean of the Faculty of Arts and Science at the University of Toronto, a position she has held since 2019. Woodin is a neuroscientist. She is an expert in inhibitory synaptic plasticity and neuronal chloride homeostasis.

Life and career
Woodin was born in Montreal, Quebec in 1972. Growing up, she attended school in Montreal, Quebec; Calgary, Alberta; and Oakville, Ontario.

Woodin graduated from the University of Toronto in 1995 with a Bachelor of Science in biology and a Master of Science in zoology in 1997. In 2001, she completed her PhD in the Department of Cell Biology and Anatomy at the University of Calgary Faculty of Medicine (later renamed the Cumming School of Medicine). Working under the supervision of Naweed Syed, she characterized the role of trophic factors in inhibitory synapse formation. During her postdoctoral studies in the lab of Mu-ming Poo at the University of California Berkeley, Woodin discovered the spike-timing dependent plasticity of inhibitory GABAergic synapses in the hippocampus.

In 2004, Woodin joined the University of Toronto as Assistant Professor in the Department of Zoology. At that time, she established the Woodin Lab which she continues to lead. She was promoted to full professor in 2017 in the Department of Cell & Systems Biology.

Woodin has served as the Associate Chair, Undergraduate Studies (Cell & Systems Biology 2014–15), Director of the Human Biology Program (2015–17), Associate Dean, Undergraduate Studies and Academic Planning (2018), and the Vice-Dean, Interdivisional Partnerships in the Faculty of Arts and Science (2019). She began her first term as Dean of Arts & Science on July 1, 2019, and was reappointed for a second term from July 1, 2024 to December 30, 2029.

She serves on the Board of Directors at the Vector Institute and Palette Skills. She is a member of the Canadian Brain Research Strategy leadership and is the President-Elect of the Canadian Association for Neuroscience, an association dedicated to advancing brain research.

Research
Woodin is an expert in inhibitory synaptic plasticity and neuronal chloride homeostasis, specifically the role of chloride transporters in regulating the strength of GABA-mediated inhibition in the brain. Using a variety of approaches including electrophysiology, biochemistry, fluorescence imaging and behavioural testing, her research aims to understand how synapses are built, the mechanisms that underlie their plasticity and their role in neuronal circuits.

Her lab uses principles learned from study of the healthy brain to unravel mechanisms that lead to neurological disorders and diseases, including autism spectrum disorder, Huntington’s disease and amyotrophic lateral sclerosis.

One of her projects seeks to understand the biological basis of motor impairments in Huntington’s disease by studying a region of the brain called the striatum and broader basal ganglia, in particular those related to inhibitory synaptic transmission. The goal is to identify cellular targets that can be treated to slow the onset of disease and reduce motor dysfunction to improve the quality of life for people with the condition and lessen caregiver burden.

Awards and honours
In 2014, Woodin was named Neuroscience Alumnus of the Year by the Hotchkiss Brain Institute at the University of Calgary. In 2021, she received the Alumni of Distinction Award from the Cumming School of Medicine.

She has been a Senior Fellow of the University of Toronto’s Massey College since 2019.