The Nature of Good Eating

Wisdom and practice tells us we can be fixed.

As mostly unhealthy, sometimes ungrateful, always good-intentioned humans, we can be fixed.

But what if our past lifestyle choices render a new commitment to health futile? What if after ten years, 30 years, half a century of smoking, drinking and eating fast food, something inside us makes change impossible, our bad habits irreversible.

These questions swam in the back of my mind as I sipped a sugar-laden energy drink while researching my latest health trends story about nutrition genomics, or "nutrigenomics."

A somewhat controversial, emerging field, nutrigenomics explains variables of well being, including risk of chronic diseases and cancer, within the context of a person's genetic make up.

For example, nutrigenomics studies have indicated that, purely due to the combination of genes that comprise an individual's unique chain of DNA, dietary chemicals can act on the human genome.

What scientists previously thought was unalterable, the expression of genes may in fact change over a person's lifetime as his or her dietary choices begin to take a toll on nature.

Laura Acosta, a registered dietician in Gainesville who offers her clients a cheek swab test that is sent to a lab for DNA analysis, said nutrigenomics can help dieticians tailor meal plans to specific individuals. She said this advancement represents a shift from general meal planning based on the ballpark guidelines of the food pyramid.

Also, beyond personalizing medicine and health, future research in nutrigenomics has the potential to help prevent chronic diseases as well as address global malnutrition by analyzing the way diets interact with the gene pools of malnourished populations, according to the UC Davis nutrigenomics studies Web site.