Mel B. Feany, MD, PhD, is a neuropathologist and Drosophila geneticist who has focused both the clinical and basic research aspects of her career as a physician-scientist on Parkinson’s disease and related neurodegenerative movement disorders. Her research laboratory investigates molecular and cellular mechanisms of Parkinson’s disease pathogenesis with an emphasis on alpha-synuclein pathobiology studied in Drosophila models of the disorder described by her group.

Most recently, work from her laboratory has outlined convergent cell biological mechanisms of dopaminergic neurotoxicity through mechanistically defined perturbations of the actin cytoskeleton.

Perhaps more importantly, Dr. Feany’s accomplished mentees are moving the field of Parkinson’s disease forward with groundbreaking work studying human genetics, patient tissue and models of Parkinson’s disease spanning the gamut from yeast to induced pluripotent stem cells.