Dana Small

Dana Small, PhD is a Senior Scientist at the RI-MUHC and Professor in the Department of Neurology and Neurosurgery at McGill University. Her research is centered in the Metabolic Disorders and Complications Program within the Centre for Translational Biology.

Her research focuses on understanding how body and mind work together to optimize behavior, particularly through neuroimaging, metabolic, and behavioral studies of ingestive behavior. She investigates how modern food environments affect brain evolution and eating behavior.

The 15 most recent publications show a consistent focus on food reward mechanisms (2025), nutrient-brain interactions (2024), addiction-genetics relationships (2023), and neural processing of taste and reward (2020-2023). These works appear in high-impact journals like Cell Metabolism and Science.