Functional Foods ─ The Connection Between Nutrition, Health, and Food Science

This new book presents a variety of important research on functional foods—foods that have another role related to disease prevention or health. The first section of the book includes chapters on the complicated relationships between nutrition, physical and mental health, and disease. Section 2 focuses on the connection between health science and food, and presents a number of case studies on the possible uses of functional foods. The book discusses important methods for nutritional interventions in relation to diseases such as obesity and other prominent health concerns in modern society.

Topics include:

• Nutrigenetics and metabolic diseases
• Nutrition intervention strategies to improve health
• Nutrition consumption timing around exercise sessions
• Nutritional therapies for mental disorders
• Health benefits of particular foods, such as eggs, milk, cereal, garlic, cinnamon, nuts, blueberries, etc.
• Mineral- and protein-enriched foods

Leah Coles, PhD, holds a Bachelor of Technology (Hons) in Food Technology from Massey University, New Zealand, and completed her PhD in Human Nutrition at the Riddet Institute, Massey University, New Zealand. She is presently a Research Fellow in the Nutritional Interventions Lab at Baker IDI Heart and Diabetes Institute, Melbourne, Australia. Her current research involves clinical trials focused on functional foods and weight loss, particularly in relation to diabetes and cardiovascular disease. She has also published several peer-reviewed articles in the area of in vitro and in vivo (animal and human) digestibility studies and linked these with mathematical models to predict the available energy (ATP) content of foods.