Spring 2013

This course will cover the functions of mammalian organisms as we understand them at various levels of organization - organ system, organ, cellular and subcellular levels. Our goal is to provide a working knowledge of the fundamental properties and regulation of these systems so that the student can understand and relate this material to that learned in other basic science courses with particular emphasis on those related to nutrition.

In this course students critically evaluate, compare, interpret, judge, summarize and explain statistical results published in research articles in health and nutrition journals that are influencing nutrition science, research, policy, and clinical practice. Students will also develop an intermediate level ability to analyzing research data with Stata statistical software.

This seminar will provide an introduction to the principles and practice of program monitoring and evaluation, with an emphasis on nutrition and nutrition-related programs in developing countries. By reviewing relevant literature and utilizing case studies in the areas of nutrition, primary health, agriculture and other fields, students will garner basic literacy of the language and tools of evaluation. This seminar will focus both on the theory and practice of conducting program evaluation and will consist of round-table discussions, guest speakers, and applied exercises of critiquing, planning, and writing evaluations. In addition to the course content, the participatory nature of the seminar is important to the overall learning process. Although there will be speakers at several sessions, the course will largely be run by the seminar participants themselves who will shape the curriculum, design assignments, and be expected to bring forth their personal experiences, opinions, and questions to the subject matter at hand.

This course will provide students a broad overview of certain aspects of both the U.S. and worldwide food supply. This course is intended to provide students with an understanding of : 1) the basic groups of foods in the food supply and their nutrient profiles; 2) the effects of harvesting, processing and storage; and 3) the important issues affecting food safety. This is an elective course.

This course will examine humanitarian aid in conflict situations from a gender perspective and highlight the policy and program implications that this dimension presents. Topics covered will include the ways in which gender relations are affected by conflict; the relationship between gender and the militarization of societies and communities; violations of human rights and women's rights; women in peace building and conflict resolution; the gender dynamics of aid and post-conflict reconstruction.

This course will cover (domestic) food and agriculture programs that focus on or operate
at the community or regional levels. Such initiatives promote local/regional agriculture
and food chain businesses that process, market, and use local or regional food products.
In tandem, public sector and NGO initiatives now sponsor programs and policies with a
community or urban food system agenda. The focus will be on more complex initiatives
such as farm-to-institution projects, regional wholesaling initiatives, and food policy
councils. A major course objective is to provide practical skills and tools for design,
strategic planning, and implementation of these programs, including assessments,
research, policy components, and funding. We will also provide contextual analyses and
critical perspectives of community-based strategies as alternative food systems
models. Key features of the course include field trips to community / local food and farm
programs, several guest presenters, and field planning experiences with area-based
planning projects. Enrollment for the full course (both semesters) is strongly encouraged
but not required.

This intensive course provides presentations, readings, and exercises relating to the broad range of nutrition interventions utilized in international programs: growth monitoring and promotion, nutrition counseling and IEC, supplementary feedings and food-based income transfers, household food security and agricultural-based interventions, micronutrient activities, and breast-feeding. The course also covers malnutrition causality, nutrition and structural adjustment, social funds, economic and food aid, active learning capacity and the nutrition transition. Finally students become well versed in program design and appraisal techniques including dynamic models and program constraint assessments, and are responsible for major exercises relating to existing programs in Asia, Africa and Latin America.

First part of a two-semester sequence required of AFE students. This course covers the major biological, chemical and physical components of agricultural systems. Each is discussed from the viewpoints of both the underlying natural processes and principles, and their significance for major agricultural, food safety, and environmental policy issues in the US today. In the first semester, the topics covered are soils, water, nutrients, and genetic resources.

Biochemical and Molecular Nutrition students must enroll in one practicum in bioresearch techniques. Students who anticipate a career in basic nutritional sciences require extensive laboratory training. Practicums in bioresearch techniques, established as a single, 1.0 credit course, will provide students with an understanding of critical experimental evaluation as well as hands-on experience in essential techniques of modern biology. In the practicum, students will answer a specific biologic question through experimentation. Faculty in participating laboratories will be responsible for providing an overview of the biologic interest of the laboratory, overseeing the development of a specific, defined project, teaching the theory of specific techniques to be employed, and training the students in the application of these techniques. Students will be evaluated through a written report and oral presentation in a laboratory meeting-type setting.

The principal goals of this student-run BMN Journal Club are to: (a) enhance graduate students’ understanding of the current state of biochemical and molecular nutrition and (b) provide experience in reviewing and critiquing research articles. In alternate week sessions, students will critically evaluate peer-reviewed articles for class discussion that reinforce the principles of various research approaches (including in vitro experiments, animal models, observational studies, clinical trials) and analytical methods. This course will also help students to develop their evaluative skills and presentation performance.

All BMN MS and PhD students are encouraged to take this course within the first two years of matriculation to the Friedman School. This will be an intellectually stimulating course that will focus on recent findings in the field. In addition to the faculty advisor for this course, other faculty will be encouraged to attend to help facilitate discussions; for each session, faculty with expertise in a topic to be discussed during that class will be invited to participate.  This approach also has the benefit of allowing students in their first and second year of the BMN program to meet and interact with a variety of Friedman faculty.   

The primary format of this course will be student-selected and -led presentations of recent publications in the biochemical and molecular nutrition literature. The course covers two semesters, meeting every two weeks. During the year, all participating students will be required to give at least one PowerPoint presentation, and submit to the class a one-page summary that addresses the study aims, methods and results, and provides a critical assessment of the article.  Presentation dates will be selected at the beginning of the semester. This course will also include two introductory faculty-led lectures on: (a) developing the skills and knowledge essential to understanding and critiquing research reports and (b) effectively communicating the relevant supporting material, results, and conclusions of primary research reports.

Inadequate physical activity and a sedentary lifestyle are thought to be important causes of many of the major diseases of developed societies, including coronary artery disease, stroke, hypertension, diabetes, obesity, osteoporosis, and arthritis. There has been an explosion of information over the past two decades on the health benefits of exercise. In addition, exercise and nutrition are closely linked, with each modifying the effects of the other. Athletes, for example, may have markedly increased needs for some nutrients, but not others. Exercise has potent effects on the metabolism of protein, energy, fat, and some micronutrients. In addition, exercise is an important form of oxidative stress, and the ability of nutrients to alter the effect of exercise is not well understood. Exercise and nutrition together offer an extremely powerful intervention for a variety of problems, including the frailty of aging, the wasting of AIDS, and the obesity that underlies most cases of diabetes and atherosclerosis. This course is designed to give students an understanding of the fundamental interactions between exercise and nutrition, and to offer students an opportunity to examine the application of nutrition to exercise and vice versa. Each lecture will also discuss how these factors are important in disease prevention, and where applicable, treatment.

This course covers nutrition issues from preconception throughout life, with a particular emphasis on nutrition correlates of normal growth and development and on the consequences of under and over nutrition. It briefly considers the role of nutrition in the context of the normal physiologic changes that occur with aging.

Required for students enrolled in the Master of Arts in Humanitarian Assistance Program. This course will examine the central role and importance of food and nutrition in complex emergencies. The implications of this for nutrition assessment, policy development, program design and implementation will be examined. This will provide an understanding of; the nutritional outcomes of emergencies (malnutrition, morbidity and mortality); and also the causes of malnutrition and mortality in emergencies (the process and dynamics of an emergency). The course will also develop a broader range of management skills needed in relation to humanitarian response initiatives.

This course teaches principles and practical skills of quantitative inquiry in an interactive seminar format. Participants will learn how to design and carry out qualitative research by drawing on weekly background readings and writings, critical case-study discussions, and practical class exercises, and also through design, implementation, and reflective evaluation of a local research project that involves practical, hands-on experience. This project utilizes an anthropological perspective and engages ethnographic methods leading to development of critical theories based on grounded evidence and interpretation. It assumes that students already have exposure to some teaching of research methods in social sciences. The course focuses on designing and conducting a qualitative research project on a particular issue. Class members collaborate as an interdisciplinary team in this inquiry. Weekly exercises include designing the project, field-note documentation, participant observation, in-depth interviews, focus groups and visual methods, and software-based qualitative analysis.

This course will provide an overview of the common nutritional and food security assessment tools. Laboratory and field methods for population wide nutritional deficiency assessment, nutritional screening and surveillance, dietary assessment, hunger and food security as well as diet diversity and food group indices will be examined. Clinical methods including body composition, biochemical and clinical factors related to macro and micronutrient deficiency will be discussed. Using practical training and demonstrations students will learn how to select and apply these methods in program-based or research-based settings. Issues of validity and reliability of these methods will be addressed mainly in the context of strengths and limitations of each method. At the end of the course, students should have some familiarity with the common nutritional assessment techniques as well as their practical applications at the individual and population wide levels.

Nutritional biochemistry and physiology as related to selected pathophysiological conditions, with attention paid specifically to dietary assessment and various indices of nutritional status. Conditions with particular relevance to clinical nutrition are emphasized.

Intermediate Epidemiology exposes students to a variety of key concepts and methods when carrying out epidemiologic studies and teaches students applied skills in analyzing epidemiologic data and interpreting study findings appropriately. This course includes a 2-hour lecture session followed by a 1-hour lab session. The lecture session will present epidemiologic methods and concepts beyond the Principles of Epidemiology, and review relevant statistical methods and their applications in epidemiologic studies. The lab session will prepare students with practical skills in conducting and analyzing epidemiologic studies using SAS. The lab session will be taught in a computer lab equipped with SAS.

This course will build on current knowledge and translation of nutrition science basis for interactions for prevention and treatment of child malnutrition (wasting and stunting) in developing countries. The emphasis will be on protein quality, micronutrient content especially iron, Vitamin A, zinc, folate and essential fatty acids. Current interventions will be analyzed and discussed in this manner with emphasis on criteria for effectiveness studies.

This course provides an advanced introduction to anthropological theory and methods designed for food and nutrition science and policy graduate students. Section 1 covers anthropology's four-field modes of inquiry, cross-cutting theoretical approaches and thematic interest groups, their respective institutions and intellectual concerns. Section 2 demonstrates applications of these concepts and methods to cutting-edge food and nutrition issues. Assignments and activities incorporate background readings, related discussions, and short writing assignments, plus an anthropological literature review on a focused food and nutrition project, relevant to their particular interests. The course overall encourages critical thinking and scientific assessment of anthropology's evidence base, analytical tools, logic, and meaning-making, in the context of contributions to multi-disciplinary research and policy teams.

This course is highly recommended for AFE students and any Friedman student with an interest in economic aspects of the food/environment interface.  In this class we will be studying a broad range of environmental and natural resource problems through the tools and concepts of microeconomics - the social science that deals with balancing our (seemingly unlimited) wants and needs within the limitations of our personal, social, and natural environments.  It therefore provides useful frameworks for considering issues such as how we protect and use our land, forests, and oceans; the impact of climate change on food production; societal investment in land, water, and soil quality; and how private and social incentives can help overcome market failures.  Economic aspects of environmental and agricultural policies will be a major focus.  

Directed Study is a mechanism for a student to receive academic credit for work completed under the tutelage of a faculty member. This is generally done on a one-to-one basis with the student taking major responsibility for his/her progress. Research conducted in a laboratory during a Directed Study project can be either problem-oriented or technique-based. Directed Studies must be supervised by Friedman School faculty.

Students must register for a Directed Study using the online form.

All doctoral students must register for NUTR403 every semester to remain in active and full time status (full time equivalent.) Grading is Satisfactory/Unsatisfactory.

Directed Study is a mechanism for a student to receive academic credit for work completed under the tutelage of a faculty member. This is generally done on a one-to-one basis with the student taking major responsibility for his/her progress. Research conducted in a laboratory during a Directed Study project can be either problem-oriented or technique-based. Directed Studies must be supervised by Friedman School faculty

Students must register for a Directed Study using the online form