
Incorporating sustainability into healthy diets
Alfred Deakin Postdoctoral Research Fellow Dr Priscila Machado is developing a new way to measure the quality of our diets considering the principles of both health and sustainability.
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Developing quality evidence and using it to tackle the diverse range of food and nutrition issues in our community.
Unhealthy diets are the leading contributor to the global burden of disease. Nutrition concerns at the population level are diverse, resulting from both under and over-nutrition. Evidence-informed interventions and policies are needed to tackle these diverse issues.
This domain consists of five research groups:
Research in this domain includes developing and evaluating interventions and translating research into policy and practice. This domain brings together researchers from the disciplines of nutrition science, dietetics, health promotion, public health, psychology, epidemiology, geography and implementation science.
Researchers have expertise in:
Alfred Deakin Postdoctoral Research Fellow Dr Priscila Machado is developing a new way to measure the quality of our diets considering the principles of both health and sustainability.
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Dr Suzanne Dixon-Suen is investigating the role of diet in the risk of developing certain cancers.
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Non-alcoholic fatty liver disease (NAFLD) is the metabolic form of fatty liver disease, caused by poor diet and physical inactivity. Weight loss through diet and exercise is the only form of treatment – but we don’t yet know what the best diet is for those affected.
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Dr Rebecca Lindberg is developing a comprehensive package of policy measures to reduce the number of Australians living without access to affordable nutritious food.
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Eating is a complex behaviour embedded in social and environmental context. Dr Rebecca Leech is exploring combinations of foods at meals and snacks across the day and identifying connections around food choices at different eating occasions.
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More parents will soon have access to a world-leading early intervention program to establish healthy eating and active play habits for first-time parents and their infants.
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Group leader:Professor Karen Campbell
Group members: Associate Professor Rachel Laws, Dr Kristy Bolton, Dr Carley Grimes, Dr Katie Lacy, Dr Penny Love, Dr Alison Spence, Dr Ewa Szymlek-Gay, Dr Kidane Gebremariam, Dr Paige van der Pligt, Dr Jazzmin Zheng
The Nutrition in first 2000 days of life group focuses on research to optimise nutrition from preconception to age five years. We work to describe what and how parents and ‘parents to be’ and their children eat, how this influences their health, where they gain their information and support, and how we can most effectively and sustainably work with them to promote healthy eating.
Our research aims to understand these issues across low and high resource countries, and countries in transition. Our group has expertise across epidemiology, nutrition and dietetics, health behaviour change interventions, the use of m-health to support behaviour change, implementation science, research translation and intervention scale up.
This group covers:
Group leader:Dr Carley Grimes
Group members: Professor Karen Campbell, Professor Judi Porter, Associate Professor Susan Torres, Dr Kristy Bolton, Dr Claire Margerison, Dr George Siopsis, Dr Sze-Yen Tan, Dr Ewa Szymlek-Gay, Dr Anne Turner, Dr Paige van der Pligt
The Nutrients and health group focuses on understanding the influence of nutrient intake on growth, metabolism, and physical and mental health outcomes across the lifespan, in order to design effective and sustainable strategies to improve health. Our group has expertise in dietary assessment methods, nutritional biomarkers, nutritional epidemiology, clinical trials and interventions.
Our research includes the assessment of dietary intake to characterise nutrient intakes and nutritional status of different population groups across the lifespan, as well as exploring determinants of nutrient intake to design and evaluate strategies to improve diets. Our group also conducts interventions to alter nutrient intakes to assess effects on health outcomes, ranging from laboratory-based clinical trials to community-based interventions.
This group covers:
Group leader:Professor Sarah McNaughton
Group members: Dr Suzanne Dixon-Suen, Dr Elena George, Dr Rebecca Leech, Dr Rebecca Lindberg, Dr Katherine Livingstone, Dr Penny Love, Dr Catherine Milte, Dr Georgie Russell, Dr Sze-Yen Tan, Dr Paige van der Pligt
The Dietary patterns and eating behaviours group focuses on understanding and characterising contemporary diets, their impact on population health and potential determinants. Our research draws on principles of nutritional epidemiology and behavioural epidemiology, using observational and experimental study designs. We consider dietary intake across the continuum from nutrients to foods to eating occasions (e.g. meals and snacks), and dietary patterns, and the interplay between these elements.
Our group examines population dietary intakes and health relationships with a focus on food-based approaches, such as dietary patterns, as an alternative to focusing on individual food components. We generate evidence on eating behaviours and their determinants to inform nutrition interventions and strategies to promote healthy and sustainable dietary patterns.
Our group works with relevant partners to facilitate research translation, and provides evidence to inform policy and practice, particularly focusing on strengthening the use of epidemiological research by stakeholders.
This group covers:
Group leader:Professor Mark Lawrence
Group members: Professor Karen Campbell, Dr Phil Baker, Dr Rebecca Lindberg, Dr Penny Love, Dr Priscila Pereira Machado, Dr Julie Woods
The Healthy and sustainable food systems group focuses on investigating and informing innovative nutrition policy reference standards and actions that promote healthy, sustainable and equitable food systems. Our group is transdisciplinary with expertise in nutrition science, public health nutrition, ecological nutrition, health promotion, dietetics, political science, food regulation and sociology.
To address the complex nature of today’s food and nutrition challenges, our research extends beyond a conventional nutrient-orientated approach to encompass foods, dietary patterns and food systems thinking.
We use qualitative and quantitative research methods and undertake modelling of the health and environmental impacts of food systems. We also undertake critical analysis of policy-making associated with:
We work with a number of leading agencies including the World Health Organization, the Food and Agriculture Organization, Cochrane Nutrition Collaboration, International Union of Nutrition Sciences, Food Standards Australia New Zealand, VicHealth and the Federal and State governments.
This group covers:
Group leader:Dr Claire Margerison and Dr Alison Booth
Group members: Dr Kristy Bolton, Dr Katie Lacy, Dr Penny Love, Dr Janandani Nanayakkara
The School food and nutrition group focuses on food and nutrition education in primary and secondary schools and the food environment in these settings. We use qualitative and quantitative solutions-focused research to examine food and nutrition issues through the eyes of school staff, principals, teachers, parents and students.
Our group has expertise in qualitative and quantitative research methods. We are a team of culturally-diverse, highly experienced public health, nutrition and dietetics academics, early career researchers and PhD candidates.
This group covers:
We work with a number of organisations such as VCAA, HEV as well as national and international academic experts in the field.