A Periodic Table of Food for better health globally
成人大片 researchers are contributing to a global effort to quantify the makeup of the world鈥檚 food supply, enabling data-driven solutions to human and planetary health challenges such as biodiversity loss, climate change and malnutrition.
Photo credit: Jacopo Maia
The Period Table of Food Initiative (PTFI) is led by nine Centres of Excellence around the world, all collaborating on the creation of standardised tools, data and training to catalogue the biomolecular composition of the world鈥檚 food supply.
In Australia, the PTFI Centre of Excellence has been established by the 成人大片鈥檚 Environment Institute (EI), with its Director, Professor Andrew Lowe, describing the initiative as crucial to the improvement of human and planetary health.
鈥淒espite the advances in measuring food composition to date, we still don鈥檛 have a complete picture of what is in the food we grow and eat, and research indicates there are thousands of unknown components in food,鈥 said Professor Lowe.
鈥淲ith standardised, comprehensive and robust food composition data available in an open-access platform as a global public resource, innovative educational offerings will be available to agriculture, health and nutrition stakeholders.鈥
Key to the PTFI鈥檚 effectiveness is its global reach, with the data capturing the particularities of several regions around the world.
鈥淭he increasingly homogenous nature of global food systems has contributed to malnutrition and the degradation of ecosystems at a global scale,鈥 said Professor Lowe.
鈥淭hese systems focus too much on producing affordable staples for dietary energy, without considering the diversity of foods which could supply these nutrients.
鈥淎 greater understanding of biomolecular composition of foods will enable stakeholders to make data-driven decisions which harness the biodiversity and nutritional benefits of local food, including those that have been neglected and underutilised.鈥
The Australian Centre of Excellence will primarily focus on the biomolecular composition of Australian foods.
Environment Institute Director, Professor Andy Lowe
Most importantly, the knowledge generated through the PTFI will be practical, and applicable to Australia and the world.
鈥淲e will focus on climate resilience of Australian food crops compared to introduced crops,鈥 said Professor Lowe.
鈥淭he PTFI and EI are both committed to providing innovative data-driven and actionable outcomes to complex global environmental challenges to improve environmental and human health. We both aim to achieve this through the development of cross-institutional, local, and international collaborations.鈥
Australia鈥檚 PTFI Centre of Excellence will be staffed by researchers from the Environment Institute, Waite Research Institute, Adelaide Analytical, Adelaide Microscopy and Mawson Analytical Spectrometry Services, and other relevant national partners.
Professor Lowe and his team will also establish a stakeholder advisory network to provide guidance on the Australian food species lists, taking into account Access-and-Benefit Sharing considerations.
The Periodic Table of Food Initiative will launch its foundational resources for the global research community in April 2024. For more information on the Initiative, visit the .
Media contact:
Professor Andrew Lowe, Director, Environment Institute, 成人大片. Phone: +61 0434 607 705, Email: andrew.lowe@adelaide.edu.au
Johnny von Einem, Media Coordinator, The 成人大片. Mobile: +61 0481 688 436, Email: johnny.voneinem@adelaide.edu.au