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Finally, as the understanding of food structure-function relations in humans
is improved, it is quite likely that responses to some food materials will be
individual in character, i.e., depending on a person's genotype. The emerging
field of pharmacogenomics is likely to be the technology leader in this area. The
goal of pharmacogenomics is to enable doctors to prescribe drugs on the basis
of a person's genetic profile. To transfer this idea to food science, human
genetic polymorphisms will need to be screened on a high-throughput basis to
determine which of these may have an effect on a person's response to food
materials. Then, ideally, food structures can be optimized for particular genetic
profiles or for targeted nutritional goals.
1.8 Conclusions
The role of food structure in the nutritional value of diets is becoming
recognized as being much more important than previously assumed. In fact,
the examination of epidemiological associations between food structure and
certain chronic and degenerative processes, from diabetes to macular degener-
ation, implicates the rate of nutrient delivery to be as important to health as the
diet's overall macronutrient composition (protein, fat, and carbohydrate). Such
provocative epidemiological results have prompted a re-examination of milk by
asking the question: ''how has the Darwinian selective pressure during evolu-
tion influenced the structure and delivery of milk components for infants?''
Each component of milk - glucose, protein, and fat - although ultimately
digestible and absorbable by the infant, is structured in such a way as to
prolong its absorption rather than to accelerate it. These interrogations of milk
are suggestive that the role of food structure should be an important part of all
future diet and health research. Such a mandate would require that structural
food chemists assemble the tools of food structure manipulation and exami-
nation expressly for use in nutrition-oriented studies. In essence, the fields of
food structure, food chemistry, and nutrition must be reunited to consolidate
the scientific depth and public health relevance of each.
References
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