What is Nutrigenetics/Nutrigenomics?

It should be pretty obvious but I nearly forgot to make this post - defining nutrigenetics and nutrigenomics

Nutrigenetics: This is, in my opinion, more of the clinical definition. Nutrigenetics seeks to understand the interplay between the genome, variant alleles and nutrition and this interplay's effect on health and athletic performance.

Nutrigenomics: This is a broader definition, looking at everything from nutrigenetics to also understanding how gene transcription is affected by nutrients and their metabolites - whether that be by acting directly as a transcription factor, altering the epigenetic state, or by altering the microbiota, which can subsequently alter gene expression.

The goal of this discipline: personalized medical nutrition therapy and a greater understanding of human evolution. It's been established that nutrition and the genome interact with each. Nutrition affects gene expression, methylation and acetylation, and nutrient requirements are defined by DNA's coding sequence, with some variants affecting nutrient needs. Ultimately, understanding what kind of nutrition in a specific environment is ideal would be the goal of nutrigenetics/nutrigenomics research. Understanding nutrigenetics may also lead to a greater understanding of how nutrition has acted as a selective factor for specific populations and give evolutionary insights. The science can hopefully, in the future, allow health practitioners to make personalized dietary recommendations, as well as employ better public policy.

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Beware the Meta-Analysis: Fat, Guidelines, and Biases

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Want To Buy: A Placebo

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Kevin Klatt, PhD, RD

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