November 13, 2018 – From his lab in a textile mill-turned-food research center, a UNC scientist has brought an important nutrient to the world’s attention. Dr. Steven Zeisel wants to make sure you’re getting enough choline. In a state-of-the-art laboratory on the North Carolina Research Campus, in the unlikeliest of places in a former textile mill town, Zeisel is overseeing scientific experiments about a nutrient that could change the way we eat.
October 3, 2018 – Choline is present in human milk, and is especially important for fetal and infant development [2,3]. “The hint that choline is important for infant development comes from the fact that in human milk, the supply of choline remains constant across the first year of life,” says Professor Carol Cheatham from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Other important nutrients, such as docosahexaenoic acid (DHA), are present in large quantities initially, but often level off after a few months.
December 12, 2018 – The importance of choline to brain development and function was first demonstrated in the 1980s, but because choline has multiple fates and functions within the body, the question of how choline levels specifically impacted neural development has remained unanswered. In research just published in The FASEB Journal, NRI director Steven Zeisel, MD PhD, and NRI assistant professor Natalia Surzenko, PhD, make a major contribution towards answering this question.
June 29, 2018 – Early introduction of eggs boosts infant blood concentrations of several key indicators of brain development, a recent study in Ecuador found. The results could have implications for infant nutrition in both the developing and developed worlds.
May 14, 2018 – Five NRI faculty members are among a team of UNC researchers receiving an award to study one of the world’s most pressing issues: the obesity epidemic. The cross-disciplinary team, known as the Heterogeneity in Obesity Creativity Hub, will leverage the strengths of Carolina’s schools of medical and health sciences, affiliated research centers and institutes, and prowess in big data management to take a novel approach to assess the underlying causes of obesity to unlock new, targeted ways to treat the disease.