Dr. Melanie Gillingham is a professor in Molecular and Medical Genetics at Oregon Health & Science University in Portland, OR. She completed her PhD in Nutrition Science at the University of Wisconsin-Madison and a post-doctoral fellowship in Genetics at OHSU. Prior to graduate school, Melanie worked as an acute care clinical dietitian in Tulsa, Oklahoma. As a metabolic dietitian, she has been investigating nutrition interventions in patients with fatty acid oxidation disorders for 25 years. Dr. Gillingham and her colleagues have studied the role of dietary protein in energy balance and metabolic control, MCT prior to exercise for exercise tolerance and triheptanoin compared to MCT on clinical outcomes in FAODs. She has a long-standing interest in the LCHADD chorioretinopathy and the lab is currently focused on understanding the pathophysiology and novel treatments for this unique retinal disease. Other research interests include measuring dietary intake with food photography, type 1 diabetes, and the relationship between glucose and fat oxidation with insulin resistance. In addition, the Gillingham lab is currently exploring oral ketones as a novel treatment for fatty acid oxidation disorders and cardiac complications of LCHADD. Melanie has two daughters and outside of work enjoys cooking, walks on the beach, snow shoeing and spending time with her husband, family and friends.