UCD Institute of Food and Health

The UCD Institute of Food and Health brings together research staff from different disciplines across UCD, all working together to deliver pioneering research in the areas including innovative animal production systems, sustainable crop production systems and smart agri technologies.

Food for Health Ireland

Connecting leaders in industry to a nationwide network of world-class researchers and facilities, to improve global health through innovation in food and give companies  in Ireland a competitive edge in the global food market.

FOOD-I

The All-Island Food Integrity Initiative is coordinated under a partnership between UCD, Queen’s University Belfast, UCC, Teagasc, Agri-Food and Biosciences Institute (AFBI), NUI Galway and Ulster University. It provides evidence-based solutions for industry and government, develops disruptive new technologies and drives behaviour change among all actors along the food chain in the shared island food system.

PLANEAT

Horizon Europe AgriFood Farm to Fork 2021 consortium to improve dietary behaviour and the health, environmental and socio-economic impacts of dietary patterns and deliver solutions for transition. Aiming for a transition of 58500 consumers to healthier and sustainable dietary patterns by 2032.

A-DIET

ERC Consolidator Grant funded UCD Research project furthering the development and acceptance of the concept of the 'nutritype' - the expression of dietary intake in a metabolomics profile.  

FNS-Cloud

EU-funded collaboration developing a cloud solution to overcome fragmentation in food and nutrition security across Europe. By federating data on diet, health, and consumer behaviour as well as sustainable agriculture and the bio-economy, it will reduce knowledge gaps that inhibit public health and agricultural policy.

Food-based biomarkers, diet quality, and cardiometabolic health

US-Ireland R&D Partnership Programme network accelerating advances in nutrition and health through research on food biomarker discovery and validation, examination of food biomarkers in relation to cardiometabolic health, and evaluating food biomarker-guided precision nutrition to improve diet quality and cardiometabolic health.

UCD Energy and Metabolism Laboratory 

Research group focused on exercise physiology and nutrition to improve health and performance. Current research projects include investigating appetite control, nutrition and exercise interventions in older adults, the impact of exercise on taste, gastrointestinal physiology and energy availability in student athletes. Funded by the Irish Research Council, Food for Health Ireland and the Health Research Board.

Childhood Obesity Surveillance Initiative

Funded by the Health Service Executive (HSE), this World Health Organization (WHO) led project is part of a pan-European initiative. It is an ongoing, systematic process of collection, analysis, interpretation and dissemination of descriptive information for monitoring obesity, being identified as a serious public health problem in the WHO European Region and for use in programme planning and evaluation.

Prof Lorraine Brennan was a member of the EU Food 2030 Expert Group

Advancing industry practice in use of seaweed for health benefits

A new market for Vitamin D enhanced mushrooms

BioBeo: Enhancing citizens‘ involvement in policy-making for bioeconomy

Prof Lorraine Brennan

Internationally recognized leader in food biomarker discovery and metabolomics, PI in UCD Institute of Food & Health and Conway institute.

Prof Dolores O'Riordan

Prof James Lyng

Professor at UCD School of Agriculture and Food Science, specialising in the use of emerging thermal and non-thermal technologies in the processing of foods. 

Dr Sharleen O'Reilly

Nutritionist and dietitian specialising in knowledge translation / implementation science, public health nutrition and behaviour change methodologies, leads EU Horizon2020 implementation project Bump2Baby and me.

Prof Seamus Fanning

Dr Sarah Browne

Assistant Professor at UCD School of Public Health, Physiotherapy and Sports Science, specialises in health behaviour change, child and adolescent nutrition, obesity, eHealth in diet and healthcare, food policy, and community malnutrition.

Prof Eileen Gibney

Deputy Director of UCD Institute of Food and Health and expert in personalised nutrition. PI of Food for Health Ireland.