Food research fellowships funded for scientists in 6 countries

(Press-News.org) DALLAS, July 18, 2024 — Diet-related diseases account for 1 in 5 deaths around the world[1] and unsustainable industrial agricultural practices threaten to compromise the health of the planet.[2] While emerging science expands our knowledge of food composition, society still understands little about the tens of thousands of components found in food.

The American Heart Association is facilitating a new research fellowship program from the Periodic Table of Food Initiative (PTFI) with support from The Rockefeller Foundation. The program, called Good Food Fellows, aims to train a new generation of scientists to significantly expand our collective understanding of food. By contributing research findings to the PTFI’s global database, the fellowships will help revolutionize agriculture and nutrition worldwide.

The Good Food Fellows program supports graduate students and early career researchers in low- and middle-income countries with research training and grants focused on the study of food quality. The first cohort, comprised of 38 fellows, will generate and apply data on food biomolecules to advance understanding of urgent human and planetary health challenges.

The Good Food Fellows program is a core offering of Food EDU, an open-access platform that provides online courses, global case studies and other educational and professional development opportunities for scientists, policymakers and food and health practitioners around the world. Food EDU’s inaugural course track, Foodomics & Society, expands on the science of food composition by highlighting the broad spectrum of biomolecules in food. Specifically, the course addresses food biomolecular connections to food systems, human nutrition, agricultural practices, climate and dietary guidelines.   

Both the Good Food Fellows program and Food EDU were established to support the work of the PTFI — a global effort to map the biomolecular composition of the world’s vast edible biodiversity using standardized analytical methods based on advanced omics technologies. The pioneering offerings of the initiative allow stakeholders to characterize known and unknown components in food coupled with food system attributes.  

Grants were awarded to six Periodic Table of Food Initiative Centers of Excellence, academic institutions selected to generate comprehensive food composition data that will train the next generation of global scientists working at the intersection of foodomics, agriculture, nutrition and health. The program’s first grantees are universities and institutes of public health in Colombia, Ethiopia, Fiji, Ghana, Mexico and Thailand:  

Javeriana University (Colombia) Ethiopian Public Health Institute (Ethiopia) The University of the South Pacific (Fiji) Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology (Ghana) National Institute of Medical Sciences and Nutrition Salvador Zubirán (Mexico) Mahidol University (Thailand) Over a two-year period, each Center is funding six or seven fellows, primarily master’s or doctoral students, as well as early career researchers. The Good Food Fellows program includes training on different omics platforms, which analyze multiple types of biological data, such as lipids, fibers and specialized metabolites, to provide a comprehensive understanding of food composition. In addition, the program will include training on community-engaged research and science communication, which are accompanied by formal mentorships, networking opportunities and an engagement platform.

The fellows’ specific research projects include the nutritional and medicinal value of underutilized food crops, the effects of climate change on crops, community knowledge and spiritual attachment to foods, nutrients in commonly consumed foods, the metabolism of bioactive compounds in local foods and eating habits related to diabetes risk.

“The entire world is facing a daunting challenge: to revolutionize agriculture and food into an enterprise that is both supportive of human health and sustainable for the planet,” said J. Bruce German, Ph.D., American Heart Association volunteer and member of the Food EDU curriculum advisory committee, the Periodic Table of Food Initiative science advisory committee and director of the Foods for Health Institute at the University of California, Davis. “The Periodic Table of Food Initiative and Food EDU will now provide young scientists from around the world with the food data and training they need to meet that challenge.”

"We started the Good Food Fellows program as an incubator to build capacity, with food at the center of workforce development. Key to our vision is building the capacity to translate knowledge to inform decision-making,” said Selena Ahmed, PhD, MSc, dean of Food EDU and global director of the Periodic Table of Food Initiative at the American Heart Association. “We see the Good Food Fellows program as a vehicle for food systems transformation to better support people and the planet."

“This is an exciting opportunity to learn and share experiences related to food and food culture through different contexts, and in this case different continents,” said Warangkana (Nadine) Srichamnong, program director of the Center of Excellence in Asia at Mahidol University. “Projects selected by Good Food Fellows will help us to understand the effect of food processing, farm management and crop variety on food composition.”

Food EDU is jointly facilitated by the American Heart Association and the Alliance of Bioversity & CIAT (International Center for Tropical Agriculture) as co-secretariats of the PTFI. Food EDU and Good Food Fellows are supported by The Rockefeller Foundation.

The American Heart Association, celebrating 100 years of lifesaving service in 2024, has funded more than $5.4 billion in cardiovascular, cerebrovascular and brain health research since 1949. New knowledge resulting from this funding benefits millions of lives in every corner of the U.S. and around the world.

The Association receives funding primarily from individuals; foundations and corporations (including pharmaceutical, device manufacturers and other companies) also make donations and fund specific Association programs and events. The Association has strict policies to prevent these relationships from influencing the science content. Revenues from pharmaceutical and biotech companies, device manufacturers and health insurance providers and the Association’s overall financial information are available here.

Additional Resources

Good Food Fellows Booklet AHA news release: Targeted scientific research projects to demonstrate effectiveness of ‘food is medicine’ in health care AHA News: New scientific resources map food components to improve human and environmental health Follow AHA/ASA news on Twitter @HeartNews ###

About the American Heart Association

The American Heart Association is a relentless force for a world of longer, healthier lives. We are dedicated to ensuring equitable health in all communities. Through collaboration with numerous organizations, and powered by millions of volunteers, we fund innovative research, advocate for the public’s health and share lifesaving resources. The Dallas-based organization has been a leading source of health information for a century. During 2024 - our Centennial year - we celebrate our rich 100-year history and accomplishments. As we forge ahead into our second century of bold discovery and impact our vision is to advance health and hope for everyone, everywhere. Connect with us on heart.org, Facebook, X or by calling 1-800-AHA-USA1.

About Periodic Table of Food Initiative

The Periodic Table of Food Initiative (PTFI) is a global effort to create a public database of the biochemical composition and function of the food we eat using state-of-the-art mass spectrometry technologies and bioinformatics. The Initiative is supported by The Rockefeller Foundation and its public charity, RF Catalytic Capital, Inc., the Foundation for Food & Agriculture Research and the Seerave Foundation and facilitated by the American Heart Association and the Alliance of Bioversity and CIAT (International Center for Tropical Agriculture).

[1] GBD 2017 Disease and Injury Incidence and Prevalence Collaborators. Global, regional, and national incidence, prevalence, and years lived with disability for 354 diseases and injuries for 195 countries and territories, 1990-2017: a systematic analysis for the global burden of disease study 2017. Lancet. (2018) 392:1789–858. doi: 10.1016/S0140-6736(18)32279-7

[2] GBD 2017 Disease and Injury Incidence and Prevalence Collaborators. Global, regional, and national incidence, prevalence, and years lived with disability for 354 diseases and injuries for 195 countries and territories, 1990-2017: a systematic analysis for the global burden of disease study 2017. Lancet. (2018) 392:1789–858. doi: 10.1016/S0140-6736(18)32279-7

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