The future of personalised Nutrition

The term Nutrigenomics refers to the effect of components in food on our gene expression. Many believe this will be  the future of personalised nutrition and this funky little tool provides an interactive guide to the history of nutrigenomics.
A short history of nutrigenomics

There’s a whole world living in your gut

The MetaHIT project is undertaking the biggest census of the bugs living inside our guts. The European study has taken samples from 124 subjects; a mixture of healthy, overweight and people suffering with inflammatory bowel disease (IBD) and identified the genes of the intestinal microbials (mainly bacteria) by DNA stretches.
The results are pretty impressive. They’ve [...]

The Diabetes Gut Link

Our understanding of the role of the microorganisms in the gut (also known as microbiota) is growing by the day.
A study published earlier this year looked at the microbial mass of diabetic and healthy populations and found that the level of Bifidobacterium species were significantly lower in the diabetic group [1]
What we eat affects the [...]

Cellular Rhythm and Dance of Life

Ever wondered just what goes on inside the body? These incredible animations from Harvard University bring to life the incredible processes and interactions of our cells to life.

Narrated by Jeff Bland PhD as part of the IFM Symposium earlier this year, this little piece of film goes right to the heard of the functional medicine [...]

What’s the evidence for Nutrition?

“Where’s the evidence based research for nutrition?” is a pretty fair question that we definitely have an answer to, it’s just that the standard of evidence for drugs and medication doesn’t really lend itself to nutrition. The big randomised control trials (RCT’s) are ideal for measuring the effect of a single intervention (drug) on a [...]

Want to know what Mercury does to your brain?

Recent posts have mentioned the reasons for avoiding mercury, the heavy metal which finds it’s way into our bodies from food (especially fish), water (it’s been found in tap water) and silver fillings. This video from the University of Calgary shows you exactly what damage the mercury does to our brain cells (neurons). It’s full [...]

Autism

Recognising the Metabolic Phenotype in Autism using Functional Laboratory Testing
I’ve been involved in organising this event on Autism to be held on Wednesday 31st March, Kings Fund, Cavendish Square, 6.00pm to 9.30pm. If you have any interest in the Autism field, as a parent of a child on the Autistic spectrum or as a nutritional [...]

What’s Really in Our Food?

Thankfully I’d finished my supper before watching last lights BBC1 show What’s Really in Our Food. Anyone fancy a lovely organic salad washed in anti-freeze? How about a tasty chicken that actually contains pork? No, doesn’t sound exactly appetising. There seem to be two main issues. One is that the marketing people are extremely talented [...]

Weight loss pill Alli monitored by FDA for liver damage

A number of health sites and publications are reporting that the FDA are monitoring the over-the-counter weight loss drug Alli for potential liver damage. The drug apparently works by inhibiting fat absorption and is supposed to be used along side a healthy diet. Weight loss is a challenge for many people, and often there can [...]

Ayurveda

I recently spent four week at the Arya Vaidya Pharmacy, in Coimbatore, South India learning about Ayurvedic medicine. It is one of the oldest medicine systems in the world, dating back some 3,000 or 4,000 years. The importance of food and nutrition in prevention of disease has always been recognised in Ayurveda. The concept of [...]