Dr. Joanne Weinberg

Dr. Joanne Weinberg is a Professor Emerita and Distinguished University Scholar in the Department of Cellular & Physiological Sciences at the University of British Columbia. She is a member of the Brain Research Center, and an Associate Member of the Department of Psychology and the Child and Family Research Institute.

Dr. Weinberg has served as President of the International Society for Developmental Psychobiology and the Fetal Alcohol Spectrum Disorders Study Group, on the Board of Directors of the Research Society on Alcoholism, and on the Editorial Advisory Boards of Alcohol,  Alcoholism: Clinical & Experimental Research, Neurotoxicology and Teratology, and Physiology and Behavior. She is currently a member of the Advisory Panel of the Intervention Network Action Team, Canada Northwest FASD Research Network and is co-leader of the FASD Project of NeuroDevNet, Networks of Centres of Excellence.

The research in Dr. Weinberg’s laboratory utilizes rat models to examine how early life experiences, in particular, prenatal alcohol exposure, alter brain and biological development from prenatal life through adulthood. Collaborative projects are investigating the role of changes in gene expression and epigenetic mechanisms in mediating the adverse effects of alcohol (Sheila Innis, Angela Devlin, Michael Kobor), as well as the long-term consequences of early pain and early medication exposure on neurobehavioral development of pre-term and term-born infants (Ruth Grunau, Tim Oberlander). Dr. Weinberg’s research is supported by grants from NIH/NIAAA (MERIT Award), NIH/NIMH, NeuroDevNet (Networks of Centres of Excellence of Canada), CIHR, the Canadian Foundation on Fetal Alcohol Research and the Coast Capital Savings Depression Research Fund.