BIOL 203 FUNDAMENTAL
NUTRITION MIDTERM 1
LESSONS 1-5 STUDY
NOTES CONCORDIA
UNIVERSITY.
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Lesson 1: Introduction to Fundamentals Nutrition
Lesson objectives
● Understand the science of nutrition and the 6 major nutrient classes
● Learn about nutrition-related chronic diseases
● Operationalize food sustainability at home
Nutrition
● How an organism acquires food and uses food to support all processes required for its
existence
Roundworm Nutrition: Through the Lens of a Biologist
● Locomotive behaviour during foraging
● Type and rate of digestion
● How nutrients are absorbed, stored and metabolized
● Neurobiology of foraging
● With only 309 neurons, the roundworm is a model organism for studying locomotion.
Studies look at how hormones influence locomotive behaviour in C. elegans. For
example, serotonin and dopamine promote slow locomotion in the presence of food
while other compounds are released to promote locomotion during exploratory behaviour
Human Nutrition
● The science of human nutrition is a young science
○ The science of foods and the nutrients they contain, and of their actions within
the body (including ingestion, digestion, absorption, transport metabolism, and
excretion). A broader definition includes the social, economic, cultural, and
psychological implications of food and eating.
● More recently, it has a sister discipline known as nutritional genomics
○ The science of how nutrients affect the activities of genes (nutrigenomics) and
how genes affect the interactions between diet and disease (nutrigenetics)
What is Food?
Do these qualify as food?
● The science of nutrition is partly to blame for any one of these being considered as food.
Food Breakdown
● Food has been broken down…
● Food ⇒ amalgam of nutrients
Not really food
● This is what brought Michael Pollan to ask are Pop-Tarts food? But of course Pop-Tarts
and protein shakes aren't really food.
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Food as an activity
● Food is much more than just a collection of vitamins and minerals
● Food and eating is a deeply satisfying activity that we engage in at least three times per
day
Feeling of Wellness and satisfaction
● Organs of the digestive system communicate with the brain and vice versa to offer a
feeling of wellness and satisfaction
Satisfying Healthy Meal
● Consider the last time you had a satisfying healthy meal and rose from the table feeling
victorious
Food is a Combination of Essential Nutrients
● Essential nutrients must be supplied by the diet because the human body cannot
synthesize them
● Absence of an essential nutrient would lead to a deficiency disease and eventually death
○ Nutrients a person must obtain from food because the body cannot make them
for itself in sufficient quantity to meet psychological needs; also called
indispensable nutrients. About 40 nutrients are currently known to be essential
for human beings.
● Too much can lead to chronic diseases or sudden death as in overdosing
● Energy Yielding Nutrients:
○ Carbohydrates
○ Lipids
○ Proteins
● Non Energy Yielding Nutrients:
○ Vitamins
○ Water
○ Minerals
What Else is Food?
● Food contains non-nutrients like fiber and phytochemicals
● Phytochemicals: Non-essential nutrients found in food and derived from plants that have
biological activity in the human body. Can reduce risk of chronic diet-related diseases
and lower risk of some forms of cancer
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The Challenge of Choosing Food
We can split our choices into a simple dichotomy
● Processed Foods
● Whole Foods
This brings us to our first and only lesson in social psychology
● The premise of the book (Navigating Environmental Attitudes) is:
○ Attitudes do not always align themselves with behaviour
○ Cognitive fix has limited power
What we need is structural and technological fixes
● These fixes by-pass or help guide human behaviour
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