Nutrigenomics: How Your Genetics Could Change the Way You Eat
Key takeaways:
Nutrigenomics studies how nutrients in your diet and your genes interact.
Nutrigenomics determines how your genes can affect your nutritional needs and how your genes and diet influence your risk of developing certain health conditions.
Treating and preventing disease rarely has just one solution, but nutrigenomics shows promise for providing a unique future solution.
With the rise of chronic diseases worldwide, many people are looking for a new solution to improve their health. While diet, exercise, and an overall healthy lifestyle lead the way, a type of genetic testing called nutrigenomics may also play a future role.
What is Nutrigenomics?
The idea of nutrigenomics, or nutritional genomics, was jump started by the Human Genome Project of the 1990s, which mapped out the entire DNA in the human genome. Because of the project, researchers began to study how nutrients, your diet, and your genes interact, and nutrigenomics was born.
Nutrigenomics looks at how the foods you eat can change the way your genes are expressed (how they work). It also looks at how your genes can determine your nutritional needs.
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How are genetics and dietary needs linked?
You aren’t just stuck with whatever genes you inherit at birth. Your genes respond to environmental influences, including what you eat. The messages your genes receive from food play a role in controlling all the molecules that make up your metabolism.
This means that even if certain genetic disorders run in your family, your diet can influence whether those genes get expressed, or “turned on,” and thus influence whether you inherit the conditions or not.
Vitamins A and D, fatty acids, protein, and the mineral zinc are some of the nutrients involved in how genes are expressed. Folate, choline, and vitamins B2, B6, and B12 are also involved. Having adequate or inadequate amounts of these nutrients may affect whether or not a gene for a disorder gets expressed.
What are the possible benefits of nutrigenomics?
The intrigue behind nutrigenomics is that it could truly personalize nutrition to optimize health. With nutrigenomics, you could learn how your genes work and, through your food choices, control the instructions they give your body. But what could this look like in the real world?
One study from the Institute for Systems Biology sequenced 108 participant’s genomes and gave them personalized nutrition advice based on their genomes. They then measured clinical markers over 9 months and found large improvements, such as a 12% improvement in inflammation after 6 months.
Another study highlighting the potential of nutrigenomics has to do with coffee and the CYP1A2 genotype. The study suggested that the risk of myocardial infarction associated with coffee intake was only there with slow metabolizers based on the CYP1A2 genotype.
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There’s also a class of conditions known as “inborn errors of metabolism,” which involve known interactions between food and inherited genes. An example is lactose intolerance, a condition resulting from a genetic variation in the lactase gene. It’s treated by manipulating the diet and removing lactose.
All of this begins to paint a picture of how nutrigenomics can help improve health outcomes, even when it comes to diseases such as cancer.
Should you use nutrigenomics to improve your diet?
Nutrigenomic testing can help you understand which nutrients you need for optimal health. For example, if you have a gene that puts you at risk of diabetes or cancer, having the information from nutrigenomic testing may motivate you to make dietary changes to reduce your risk of developing those diseases.
However, nutrigenomics does not provide any diagnoses. Many people with certain genes may never develop a condition associated with those genes. All in all, the research still has a long way to go.
Most health insurance plans will cover the cost of certain types of genetic testing when recommended by a physician. However, all coverage and reimbursement is subject to Medicare, Medicaid, and third-party payer benefit plans. In many cases, genetic nutrition testing must be paid for out of pocket. Genetic tests are typically done at home using a DNA swab (such as saliva). The test results can give you actionable insight into conditions like heart disease, weight loss, hormones, detoxification, and more.
Ultimately, treating and preventing disease and health conditions doesn’t have just one solution.
Even when using information from nutrigenomic testing, other factors — like smoking, exposure to pollution, physical activity, substance and medication use, and more — must also be addressed. Whether you choose to pursue nutrigenomic testing is up to you. Discussing the topic with a trained healthcare provider for further insight is a good idea.
The bottom line
The study of nutrigenomics to determine how nutrients in food and your genes influence each other has promising potential. However, the research is still emerging, and the large-scale use of nutrigenomics to create personalized nutrition is still far off. If you’re curious, discuss nutrigenomics with your doctor.
As for now, the old advice holds the truest: Focus on a diverse diet of nutritious, whole foods, and minimize ultra-processed foods as much as possible.
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References
American Heart Association. (2016). Nutrigenomics, the microbiome, and gene-environment interactions: New directions in cardiovascular disease research, prevention, and treatment. Circulation.
Arnold, G. L. (2018). Inborn errors of metabolism in the 21st century: past to present. Annals of Translational Medicine.
Cousins, R. J. (1999). Nutritional regulation of gene expression. The American Journal of Medicine.
Cornelis, M. C., et al. (2006). Coffee, CYP1A2 genotype, and risk of myocardial infarction. Journal of the American Medical Association.
Institute for Systems Biology. (2017). Pioneer 100 study establishes eoundation for new industry of scientific wellness.
National Cancer Institute. (n.d.). Nutrigenomics.
National Human Genome Institute.(n.d.). The Human Genome Project.
National Human Genome Institute. (2022). Gene expression.
National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences.(2022). Gene and Environment Interaction.
PricewaterhouseCoopers. (n.d.). Chronic diseases and conditions are on the rise.
The Nutrition Society. (2018). Nutrigenomics. The basics.
