Sweet Drinks

How many sugar-sweetened beverages are we drinking, and are they related to obesity? Beverages comprise 47% of added sugar intakes in American diets, of which 39% come from sugar-sweetened beverages (SSBs). SSBs include soft drinks (25%); fruit drinks, not including 100% fruit juices (11%);...

Alcohol and Health

How is alcohol handled in the body? Alcohol is among the only drugs consumed regularly in the diet other than caffeine. It is water-soluble and distributed into all tissues and fluids in relative proportion to water content. As a result, equal quantities of alcohol...

Land Animals and Animal-Based Foods

What animals are consumed for food, and how do they differ nutritionally? Between 1970 and 2011, the number of animals raised for food increased three-fold, from 7.3 billion to 24.2 billion. A wide variety of animals are eaten across the world and contribute up...

Whole Grains, Refined Grains, and Gluten

What are cereal grains and “pseudograins”? Grains like wheat, corn, oats, and rice are cereal grasses, the fruit or seed of the grass family; many grains are thus referred to as “cereals.” Some plants from the broadleaf family, like amaranth, buckwheat, and quinoa, are...

Creating a Colorful Plate

How do vegetables differ nutritionally? Botanically, vegetables are the edible parts of plants and, thus, technically include fruits (the seed-containing, mature ovary). Vegetables are mainly carbohydrates, including starch, nonstarch polysaccharides, and fibers with varying levels of vitamins C, K, E, B6,...

Diets and Food Environments Today

What are the influencers and major drivers of eating behavior and food choices in today’s world? For millions of years during the course of evolution, the human diet was driven simply by hunger and accessibility. As civilizations developed, money also became a factor in...

How Revolutions, Discoveries, and Inventions Shape Our Diet

What is the Paleolithic diet? What did hunter–gatherers actually eat? While “Paleo” diets may seem to be a 21st-century fad, the concept has solid scientific roots in the disciplines of evolutionary biology and anthropology. The first article discussing the diet of early humans...

Global Food and Nutrition Challenges

Who is affected by hunger, food insecurity, and malnutrition? Global hunger has been decreasing steadily in recent years, from about 900 million in 2000 to 777 million in 2015, or about 1 in 9 individuals worldwide. Despite population growth, hunger in the developing world...

Putting It All Together

Is focusing on individual nutrients and foods important for health? Nutrition is a biomedical science with roots in analytical chemistry. As such, it has relied traditionally upon reductionism, the philosophy dominating traditional Western medicine that reduces phenomena to their smallest components. In the...

Water Dwellers

What are the nutritional benefits of seafood? Like other animal foods, fish and shellfish are excellent sources of protein, as well as a number of B-complex vitamins, vitamin D, and minerals like iron, zinc, and selenium. There are five major categories of seafood. ...