UBC Science Welcomes New Associate Dean for Faculty Affairs and Strategic Initiatives

UBC Science has appointed Zoology Professor Vanessa Auld to a five-year term as Associate Dean for Faculty Affairs and Strategic Initiatives, effective September 1, 2010.

"I'm delighted that Vanessa is taking on this portfolio," says Dean of Science Simon Peacock. "I look forward to working with her to oversee and advance a host of important faculty initiatives, including recruitment, retention, mentoring, diversity, career evolution, and related policies and procedures."

Auld is internationally recognized for her research into the role glia (non-neuronal cells) play in the development and function of the nervous system. Her research has been published in leading science journals including Cell, Science and the Proceedings of the National Academy of Science, and is supported by the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada and the Canadian Institutes of Health Research.

Auld received her PhD in Medical Genetics from the University of Toronto in 1990, completed a post-doctoral fellowship at the University of California Berkeley, and joined UBC as an assistant professor in 1994.

At UBC, Auld has taught a variety of neurobiology and physiology courses, and has supervised numerous undergraduate and graduate research projects. She earned an NSERC University Faculty Award in 1994, a Peter Wall Institute Early UBC Scholar Award in 2003, and was a Howard Hughes Medical Institute International Scholar from 1997 to 2001.

Auld assumes the portfolio from Anne Condon, who will take over the the headship of the Department of Computer Science, effective July 1, 2011.