EARLYNUTRITION FOR THE PUBLIC
This website provides information about the research project EarlyNutrition, which is funded by the European Union.
Worldwide, EarlyNutrition is the largest project investigating programming effects for health in later life.
Researchers from 35 institutions in 12 European countries, the United States and Australia have joined forces to study how early nutrition programming and lifestyle factors impact the rates of obesity and related disorders.
The term programming effect refers to the finding that nutrition and lifestyle during pregnancy and infancy can affect a range of different bodily functions. These programmed changes in the body increase the likelihood of becoming overweight and the occurrence of associated diseases in later life. Such effects have been confirmed by earlier research by the FP6-funded Early Nutrition Programming project EARNEST.