NS Paper of the Month

(135) rss icon
Coprococcus in your gut: the secret of happiness?   

Today it is well established that our physical wellbeing partially depends on the trillions of microbes in our gut, the intestinal microbiome. At same time, there is emerging evidence that these unicellular lifeforms can also influence our mental status and cognitive performance.

Read more

Always tired? Read how nutrition can influence fatigue

Fatigue is a symptom resulting from the weakening or depletion of one's physical and/or mental resources, ranging from a general state of lethargy to a specific, work-induced burning sensation within one's muscles. It is a highly prevalent feeling but still remains an often-neglected unmet clinical need.

Read more

From Farm to Mouth: How Food Policy Groups Are Transforming Food Systems in High-Income Countries

Today’s food systems in high-income countries face several challenges, including a lack of resiliency, resulting in an inconsistent food supply and changing food prices, especially during crises. When faced with this type of challenge, high-income countries tend to rely on short term food relief that doesn’t always meet people’s nutritional needs or choices. In addition, limited access to nutrition education and cooking skills programs makes it hard for those most at risk to use what food they do have effectively. To address these challenges, a focus on local or regional food systems is considered one way to boost food system resilience.  

Read more

Encouraging veggies over fries!

What we eat is influenced by a myriad of external factors: our mood, the occasion, friends and family, new food trends, the location, food presentation, to name only a few. We tend to choose our food differently at a wedding reception surrounded by people we are meeting for the first time than at a garden BBQ with family and friends after a rough day at work.

Read more

From Overeating to Brain Aging: How diet and obesity impact the gut-brain interaction

With the ongoing global epidemic of obesity and increasing prevalence of dementia, evaluating the impact of over-eating and different diets on brain structure and function becomes increasingly important. Recent studies suggest that the gut microbiota and metabolic changes can impact with cognitive health. In this paper of the month, we were interested in the impact of obesity and diet on the gut-brain axis.

Read more

The double-edged sword of keeping livestock: balancing nutritional benefits with disease risks in poor nations

In many low- and lower-middle-income countries, particularly in Sub-Saharan Africa (SSA), where mixed crop-livestock farming is widely practiced, livestock keeping provides income, food, nutrition and other benefits for the rural poor. The nutritional benefits of livestock keeping are particularly important since malnutrition continues to cause nearly half of annual global child deaths, and can have lasting effects on the physical growth and cognitive development of millions of surviving children.

Read more

A greener deal for ready meals

Ready meals are a popular choice in the UK, and it is estimated that almost 90% of us eat them. Many ready meals can be classified as ultra-processed foods, which often have multiple added ingredients such as sugar, salt, fat, artificial colours, or preservatives, and consumption of ready meals has been associated with an increased risk of obesity. However, the jury is still out on the nutritional quality of ready meals.

Read more

The health effects of alternative plant-based meats on inflammation

The Paper of the Month for February is 'Assessing the effects of alternative plant-based meats v. animal meats on biomarkers of inflammation: a secondary analysis of the SWAP-MEAT randomized crossover trial' and the blog is written by author Anthony Crimarco, Ph.D. and is published by the Journal of Nutritional Science and is free to access for one month.

Read more

Excess body weight exacerbates the harmful effect of alcohol on cancer risk

Excess body weight and alcohol consumption are both modifiable risk factors for many adverse health outcomes, including cancer. Alcohol is classified as Group 1 carcinogen by the International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC), and alcohol consumption is associated with a higher incidence of seven cancer types. Excess body weight is also associated with at least 13 cancer types. Although these factors have been known to be linked with cancer for many years, very few studies have investigated the joint association between alcohol consumption and excess body weight with cancer risk.

Read more

Expanding the use of a revolutionary therapy in childhood wasting

The development of ready-to-use therapeutic food (RUTF) and the advent of the community-based management of acute malnutrition (CMAM) model of care revolutionized the management of severe acute malnutrition in children living in low- and middle-income countries. In addition to improved recovery rates and decreased mortality rates, the CMAM model democratized care for children in remote settings by bringing care to the village and household level. This approach has been further expanded to include children with moderate acute malnutrition as well. Scaling up coverage of care and optimizing treatment protocols remain high on the global nutrition agenda.

Read more

Structural racism impacts African Americans’ ability to eat a healthy diet. What can we do as nutrition researchers and practitioners?

Nutrition researchers and public health practitioners have become increasingly focused on structural racism following protests against racial injustice in 2020 and the disparities in covid-19 mortality experienced by marginalized groups. Structural racism consists of overlapping systems of discrimination in society such as in policing, housing, and employment. These systems also affect marginalized groups’ ability to access healthful food. For example, African Americans are more likely to live in areas with higher densities of fast-food restaurants and may not have access to full-service grocery stores. Differences in financial resources may also impact their ability to pay for healthy food. Providing nutrition education alone can be insensitive in the face of these obstacles.

Read more

Are modern-day plant-based foods taking us in the wrong direction?

We need to act now to limit increasing global temperatures by reducing greenhouse gas emissions to meet global targets set out in the Paris Agreement. Among other things, this means changing our diets and reducing our consumption of meat and dairy since livestock production has the highest environmental impact in the food system. Hence, the need to transition away from diets high in animal products to more plant-based diets.

Read more

Dietary protein requirements and recommendations – why is it so complex?

The Paper of the Month for April is ‘Dietary protein requirements and recommendations for healthy older adults: a critical narrative review of the scientific evidence‘ and the blog is written by author Lars Holm, Yusuke Nishimura, Grith Højfeldt, Leigh Breen and Inge Tetens published by Nutrition Research Reviews and is free to access for 1 month.…

Read more

Persisting inequalities, retaining child anemia vulnerabilities

Anemia or low hemoglobin concentration in the blood is a serious public health problem, affecting one-fourth of the global population. Children under five years of age carry the highest toll of this burden. Approximately 145 thousand children die per year worldwide due to nutritional deficiencies including iron-deficiency anemia. Therefore, wiping out of anemia can save avoidable child deaths.

Read more

Stress and diet interact to change our brain’s response to the foods we eat

After a long, hard day - taking care of the kids, going to work or school, keeping up the house - would you rather sit down for a snack or to a large, satisfying meal? When we eat, our bodies receive necessary fuel, but food does more than provide nutrients. Food is a natural reward that makes us feel good, and there is a greater variety of foods available now than ever before. However, stress from day-to-day life and internal stressors interact with what we choose to eat. Within this context, we can explore how acute or chronic stress alter food intake behaviours that may contribute to the increasing prevalence of obesity worldwide.

Read more

Reducing ultra-processed foods in your diet is an effective way to lower your intake of saturated fats

Ultra-processed foods are industrial formulations of processed food substances (like oils, fats, sugars, starch, protein isolates) that contain little or no whole food and typically include flavorings, colorings, emulsifiers and other cosmetic additives. These characteristics in addition to their low-cost, convenience and aggressive marketing make them very appealing to eat. Almost irresistible.

Read more

How a nutrition-sensitive agroecological intervention improved women’s mental health

Maria is a smallholder farmer in rural Singida, Tanzania. We worked together for the past few years on the Singida Nutrition and Agroecology Project (SNAP-Tz), a nutrition-sensitive agroecological intervention that sought to improve children’s diet. In it, farmers learned about and experimented with sustainable agriculture, nutrition, and gender equity using an integrated and participatory curriculum

Read more

Food insecurity and hunger drives higher levels of fast-food consumption in adolescents

Fast-food is sold in restaurants and snack bars as a quick meal or to be taken out, and often consists of low-nutrient and energy-dense foods. Consequently, fast-food consumers tend to have higher intakes of energy, fat, saturated fatty acids, trans fatty acids, sugar and sodium, as well as lower intakes of fibre, macronutrients and vitamins. This means that regular fast-food consumers have a higher risk of multiple physical and mental health complications. Worryingly, among adolescents the consumption of fast food is on the rise across the globe.

Read more

Can we nudge populations’ diets?

The challenges in improving nations’ diets persist. As we try to overcome these, an area that is gaining traction is nudging. But can nudge-based interventions change food choice, and enable better decisions when it comes to choosing what to eat? And actually, how effective are they in real-world settings?

Read more

The Eurasian lactase persistence variant LCT-13910 C/T is associated with vitamin D levels in individuals living at high latitude, more so than exposure to sunlight

The Nutrition Society Paper of the Month for March is from the Journal of Nutritional Science and is entitled: The Eurasian lactase persistence variant LCT-13910 C/T is associated with vitamin D levels in individuals living at high latitude, more so than exposure to sunlight by Amir Moghaddam.…

Read more

Strategies to Address Anaemia Among Pregnant and Lactating Women in India

The Nutrition Society Paper of the Month for April is from Public Health Nutrition and is entitled ‘Strategies to address anaemia among pregnant and lactating women in India: a formative research study’ by Pamela A Williams, Jon Poehlman, Katelin Moran, Mariam Siddiqui, Ishu Kataria, Anna Merlyn Rego, Purnima Mehrotra and Neela Saldanha.…

Read more

Maternal dietary selenium intake is associated with increased gestational length and decreased risk for preterm delivery.

The Nutrition Society Paper of the Month for January is from The British Journal of Nutrition and is entitled: ‘Maternal dietary selenium intake is associated with increased gestational length and decreased risk of preterm delivery’ by Malin Barman, Anne Lise Brantsæter, Staffan Nilsson & Margaretha Haugen, Thomas Lundh, Gerald F.…

Read more

The SDI: a new index for assessing the sustainability of dietary patterns

The Nutrition Society Paper of the Month for June is from the British Journal of Nutrition and is entitled ‘Development and validation of an individual sustainable diet index in the NutriNet-Santé study cohort’ by Authors Louise Seconda, Julia Baudry, Philippe Pointereau, Camille Lacour, Brigitte Langevin, Serge Hercberg, Denis Lairon, Benjamin Allès and Emmanuelle Kesse-Guyot.

Read more

Barriers to exclusive breast-feeding in Indonesian hospitals

The Nutrition Society Paper of the Month for August is from Public Health Nutrition and is entitled ‘Barriers to exclusive breast-feeding in Indonesian hospitals: a qualitative study of early infant feeding practices’ by Authors: Valerie J Flaherman, Shannon Chan, Riya Desai, Fransisca Handy Agung, Hendri Hartati and Fitra Yelda.

Read more

Vitamin D and inflammatory markers

The Nutrition Society Paper of the Month for October is from the Journal of Nutritional Science and is entitled 'Vitamin D and inflammatory markers: cross-sectional analyses using data from the English Longitudinal Study of Ageing (ELSA)'. Authors: Cesar de Oliveira, Jane P Biddulph, Vasant Hirani and Ione Jayce Ceola Schneider present the key findings to their paper below.

Read more

Skipping breakfast does not result in increased overall energy intake (EI)

The Nutrition Society Paper of the Month for September is from British Journal of Nutrition and is entitled ‘Effect of breakfast omission and consumption on energy intake and physical activity in adolescent girls: a randomised controlled trial'  Authors: Julia K. Zakrzewski-Fruer, Tatiana Plekhanova, Dafni Mandila, Yannis Lekatis and Keith Tolfrey present the key findings to their paper below.

Read more

Is a Gluten Free Diet Effective in Counteracting the Neurological and/or Psychiatric Symptoms of Coeliac Disease?

The Nutrition Society Paper of the Month for May is from Nutrition Research Reviews and is entitled ‘The progression of coeliac disease: its neurological and psychiatric implications‘, by Giovanna Campagna, Mirko Pesce, Raffaella Tatangelo, Alessia Rizzuto, Irene La Fratta, Alfredo Grilli Coeliac Disease (CD) was recently presented by The European Society for Pediatric Gastroenterology, Hepatology and Nutrition, describing it as “… an immune-mediated systemic disorder elicited by gluten and related prolamines in genetically susceptible individuals and characterized by a variable of gluten-dependent manifestations, CD-specific antibodies, HLA-DQ2 or HLA-DQ8 haplotypes, and enteropathy” [1].…

Read more

Meal timing, what do we know?

The Nutrition Society Paper of the Month for November is from Nutrition Research Reviews and is entitled ‘When to eat? The influence of circadian rhythms on metabolic health: are animal studies providing the evidence?‘.…

Read more

The Protein Effect: Association of Protein Intake with the Change of Lean Mass Among Elderly Women

In recent years, there has been growing attention around skeletal lean mass in elderly health. The Nutrition Paper of the Month for April is from Journal of Nutritional Science and is entitled 'Association of protein intake with the change of lean mass among elderly women: The Osteoporosis Risk Factor and Prevention – Fracture Prevention Study (OSTPRE-FPS)'.

Read more