Nutrigenomics attempts to study how nutrition influences gene expression and metabolic pathways. It examines the dietary signatures - patterns of gene, protein, and metabolite expression - produced in cells and tissues in response to specific nutrients. Nutrigenomics seeks to understand how these signatures impact homeostasis and may help identify early biomarkers for conditions like insulin resistance. It takes a holistic approach using omics technologies like transcriptomics, proteomics, and metabolomics. Nutrigenomics also examines how genetics and environment interact to influence nutritional needs and responses.

1. Nutrigenomics
Senthil Natesan

2. What is nutrigenomics?
• Nutrigenomics attempts to study the genome-wide
influences of nutrition and to understand the
mechanisms that underlie these genetic
predispositions
• Patterns of gene expression, protein expression and
metabolite production in response to particular
nutrients or nutritional regimes can be viewed as
‘dietary signatures
• Nutrigenomics seeks to examine these dietary
signatures in specific cells, tissues and organisms, and
to understand how nutrition influences homeostasis.
Muller and Kersten, 2003.Nutrigenomics: goals and strategies.
Nature reviews Genetics 4 :315-322

3. Muller and Kersten, 2003.Nutrigenomics: goals and strategies.
Nature reviews Genetics 4 :315-322

4. In future, nutrigenomics tools should allow the collection of ‘healthy’ diet-related expression
signatures as appropriate baseline data (panel a). By comparing these signatures with ‘stress’
signatures (panel b) that are derived from nutrigenomics experiments, we might be able to
identify early molecular biomarkers for individuals with sensitive genotypes under sustained
metabolic and pro-inflammatory stress that could lead to serious conditions such as cirrhosis or
insulin resistance.With enough early warning, dietary intervention might reverse this process,
regain homeostatic control and prevent these conditions in at-risk groups

6. Holistic approach
• Foods are digested, absorbed and distributed in the
body. Food stuffs contain macronutrients
(carbohydrates, lipids and proteins) and micronutrients
(vitamins, minerals, trace elements). These nutrients
induce changes at RNA, protein and metabolite level in
the receiving cell or organism.
• The corresponding profiling technologies, namely
transcriptomics (gene expression analysis), proteomics
(protein expression analysis) and metabolomics
(metabolite profiling) are applied to better understand
and assess these effects in a holistic fashion.
Kussmann et al.2008 Profiling techniques in nutrition and health research
.Current Opinion in Biotechnology 19:83–99

8. Mulche et al. 2005 Nutrigenomics and
nutrigenetics: the emerging faces of
nutrition The FASEB Journal 19 : 1602-
1616

9. Insulin resistance and type 2 diabetes
mellitus
• T2DM is a metabolic disorder, stemming from either an
insufficient secretion or impaired action of
insulin, characterized by hyperglycemia, dyslipidemia, and
associated with impaired carbohydrate, protein and lipid
metabolism diets high in fat and energy have been
repeatedly shown to play a fundamental role in the onset
of T2DM.
• However, evidence exists that both environmental and
genetic factors are important in the etiology of T2DM.
• Recent mechanistic work using mouse models with various
genetic modifications affecting lipid metabolism have
conclusively demonstrated a relationship between lipids
and disease state
Mulche et al. 2005 Nutrigenomics and nutrigenetics: the emerging
faces of nutrition The FASEB Journal 19 : 1602-1616

10. Genotype and nutrition
• The field of Nutrigenetics is rapidly discovering in
molecular (sequence) detail those genetic
differences across the human population that are
related to differences in needs for or responses to
various nutritional variables
• Nonetheless, as the genes responsible for human
diversity are recognized, the capabilities of
genotyping to provide individuals with actionable
knowledge about their unique predispositions for
diet, drugs, and lifestyle will invariably increase as
both a scientific and commercial reality.
Fay and Gernman 2008.Personalizing foods: is genotype necessary?
Current Opinion in Biotechnology 19:121–128

11. Environment x genotype = imprinting
Lifestage
• The nutritional requirements of humans vary according tomany
features of an individual’s stage in life.
Environment
• The environment in which an individual lives is taken in this review
to include all aspects of exogenous inputs to their
phenotypes, including acute and chronic, random and
volitional, and chemical and behavioral.
Environment x genotype = imprinting
• Environment at one stage of an individual’s life can exert persistent
effects on the nutritional phenotype later in life
(imprinting, programming, memorization, or colonization). The
explicit covalent modifications of DNA that persists through cell
divisions are now recognized and are increasingly well described in
the field of epigenetics
Fay and Gernman 2008.Personalizing foods: is genotype necessary?
Current Opinion in Biotechnology 19:121–128

12. olfactory preference and nutrition
• The remarkable property of olfactory preference is the
process by which positive and negative preferences for
particular flavors are acquired in an individual as a
series of complex, contextual memories early in life .
• This system of acquired flavor preferences underlies
much of the cultural variation in foods and cuisines
around the world.
• This also means that flavor preferences for foods with
poor nutrient quality, if acquired by an individual early
in life, will guide a life long habit of poor food choice
Fay and Gernman 2008.Personalizing foods: is genotype necessary?
Current Opinion in Biotechnology 19:121–128

13. Nutrition and food science go genomic
• Diet and food components are prime environmental factors
that affect the genome, transcriptome, proteome and
metabolome, and this life-long interaction defines the
health or disease state of an individual.
• Profiling technologies are used in basic-science applications
for identifying the mode of action of foods or particular
ingredients, and are similarly taken into the science-driven
development of foods with a defined biofunctionality.
• Biomarker profiles and patterns derived from genomics
applications in humans should guide nutrition and food
science in developing evidence-based dietary
recommendations and health-promoting foods.
Rist et al. 2006. Nutrition and food science go genomic TRENDS in Biotechnology 24(4): 172-178

17. Where do we stand, and where do we
go from here?
• Genome–food interactions are the paradigm for the interplay
between the human genome and its environment.
• Nutrition and food science are stepping into the genomics era, and
it is becoming evident that nutrients and other food components
are key factors in altering gene transcription, protein levels and
functions, and the metabolome, which eventually translates into a
health or disease state on the basis of a given genome
• Knowledge regarding the response of mammalian organisms to
changes in diet or in response to individual nutrients and non-
nutrient components of foods can be gathered by expression
arrays, proteome analysis and metabolite profiling technologies
• All of these techniques should enable the determination of
metabolic markers that can guide the assessment of the health
status of humans and provide measures for food-derived effects on
human metabolism.
Rist et al. 2006. Nutrition and food science go genomic TRENDS in Biotechnology 24(4): 172-178

18. Products Fabricated
for Personalized Nutrition
The nutritional genomics approach has created hopes that gene-
based nutrition planning can one day play a significant role in
preventing chronic disease, and industry has an interest in using
this knowledge for commercial purposes.
Some relevant questions in this respect include
(a) whether the scientific evidence base is sufficiently strong to justify
creating a special nutritional product;
(b) how personalized-nutrition products can reach the correct target
group;
(c) whether the advent of personalized-nutrition products will
encourage people to believe that only some individuals need to
adopt a healthy diet or will create unwarranted or exaggerated
hopes and expectations; and
(d ) how such a development can be counteracted.

19. Biobanks in Nutrigenomics
• A biobank is a repository of collected bodily substances or
DNA often linkable to data on health or lifestyle of the
donor.
• Related terms include gene bank, genetic biobank, DNA
bank, or genetic database .
• Large population-based gene banks such as DeCode (from
Iceland), the BioBank UK, the Estonian Genome Project, or
the Genome Database of the Latvian Population
• Other types of biobanks include smaller collections of
samples and data from single studies or derived within a
clinical context that are stored in a systematic manner and
may be linked to health relevant data