| Corporate America is going healthy! Hurray for | | | | achieve an enhanced understanding of the relation |
| Wal-Mart and its recent decision to expand their | | | | between nutrition and genetics, we will be able to eat |
| organic section, the fastest-growing category of all | | | | a la carte, according to our individual DNA codes, to |
| food. Hopefully, consumers will not get discouraged | | | | prevent and mitigate aging and chronic illnesses. |
| by the recent epidemics of E. coli infections from | | | | Ciao to genetic determinism! Our genetic inheritance |
| contaminated greenies lots that have affected people | | | | won't give us any more troubles. The results of a |
| around the country. | | | | simple blood test will be sent to us with |
| The increased availability of organic products is zilch in | | | | recommendations on what foods will keep us healthy. |
| front of the forthcoming healthy food revolution. | | | | As you may imagine, the food industry is getting |
| Picture a future where food-shelving in supermarkets | | | | ready to make their next trillion dollars thanks to this |
| adjusts to people's genetic types. A future where | | | | new knowledge. |
| the general public will still be educated to shun sodas | | | | Scientists are also becoming familiarized with the |
| and stick to mandatory five-veggies-a-day, but will | | | | intricate way in which genes operate, with "switches" |
| have a much better account of why everybody | | | | that turn them on or off, depending on the |
| does not respond equally to the same diet. | | | | organism's interaction with the environment. All |
| Nature is controlled by three biological laws, Jean | | | | together with the study of how food bioactive |
| Baptiste Lamarck (1809) had argued: | | | | compounds work in the body, more possibilities are |
| 1. environment influences organ development; | | | | opening to the development of personalized diets and |
| 2. the body changes its structure according to the | | | | medications. |
| use and disuse of its parts, and | | | | A resulting new field is that of nutritional genetics or |
| 3. acquired characteristics can be inherited. | | | | nutrigenomics (not yet in our dictionaries) which can |
| After Charles Darwin explained evolution by natural | | | | examine the byproducts of metabolism and use |
| selection (1859), biologists rated the ideas of his | | | | informatics to identify and predict what impact |
| predecessor as nonsense. | | | | nutrition will have on the health of an individual with |
| Recently, the German scientist Andreas Plagemann | | | | certain genotype. Genomics refers to the |
| revived Lamarck's theory, when he concluded that a | | | | identification of an organism's sequence of genes and |
| high diabetes risk can be passed on to several | | | | its variants, and nutrigenomics is the specific |
| generations, and that this is not caused by | | | | application of this knowledge to food processing and |
| spontaneous mutation, but due to the inheritance of | | | | consumption. |
| an acquired condition. Studies have shown that | | | | Epigenetics, another related field, studies the changes |
| unborn rats from diabetic rat-moms have increased | | | | in genetic expression that are not linked to alterations |
| levels of insulin. It seems that brain cells (the ones in | | | | in the DNA sequences. Genetic expression refers to |
| charge of hunger and satiety) are irreversibly | | | | the fact that even though we may inherit certain |
| damaged by the excessive sugar in the mom's blood. | | | | features from our parents, these require specific |
| (ourfood.com/Nutritional_Genomics_html.) | | | | environmental conditions to prompt the switching of |
| Plagemann has not been alone. How to elucidate, for | | | | genes on or off before an illness manifests in the |
| example, why lactose intolerance affects Asians and | | | | body. An example from my own practice: The only |
| Africans more often than northern Europeans? | | | | child in his family with a very early awareness of the |
| According to biologist Jim Kaput, founder of the | | | | connection diet-diabetes, a man was spared the |
| diagnostic company NutraGenomics, this is explained | | | | condition suffered by his parents and five siblings. At |
| because between 6,500 and 12,000 years ago a | | | | 60 he continues to be very careful of what he eats |
| change in Europeans' DNA occurred, which allowed | | | | and has never developed high blood sugar. |
| them to digest lactose during a season when food | | | | Although epigenetics doesn't completely support |
| was scarce and milk became essential for survival. | | | | Lamarck's concepts, it raises the possibility that |
| This modification was passed on to their offspring, he | | | | "epimutations," as these gene-turning on or off of |
| said. | | | | genes are called, could play a role in evolution. |
| The international human genome project, formally | | | | The turn of this century finds science exploring |
| finished in 2006 after 16 years of research, left | | | | further into the human organism and forcing it to |
| scientists with a reference map for the 25 thousand | | | | reveal its deepest biological secrets. In the astounding |
| or so genes in the human genome (hereditary | | | | past decade, technology has provided new tools not |
| information encoded in the DNA) and the more than | | | | only to better scrutinize the body but also to intrude |
| 3 billion common variants lurking inside those genes. | | | | and alter it. Technology applied to biology fascinates |
| Why are some people more likely to suffer cancer or | | | | and scares me. Humans have gone quite far in the |
| cataracts? Is it not yet completely clear how the | | | | search for knowledge, and maybe too far in their |
| genome would explain health and disease. | | | | ambition to manipulate and control biology. Instead of |
| Researchers try to answer these and more looming | | | | acquiescently and respectfully accepting and waiting |
| questions as they look to the impact diet has on our | | | | for nature to do its job, man wants to step ahead |
| genes. The work done so far to identify our genetic | | | | and become the He-god of evolution. Nobody knows |
| map carries the promise that labs will be able to | | | | yet at what cost. |
| provide individual genetic profiles. As scientists | | | | |