The Case Against Sugar

Prepare to have your understanding of sugar radically challenged. "The Case Against Sugar" isn't just another diet book; it's a deep dive into the history, science, and politics of this ubiquitous substance. This isn't about willpower or fleeting trends; it's about uncovering the uncomfortable truth: sugar may be less a food and more akin to a drug, subtly manipulating our bodies and shaping our health policies. You'll embark on a journey through time, from sugar's rare beginnings to its current omnipresence, exploring its surprising connections to industries like tobacco and the ways in which scientific inquiry has been, at times, deliberately misled. Expect a rigorously researched, meticulously argued, and at times infuriating exposé that will leave you questioning everything you thought you knew about the sweet stuff. Prepare to arm yourself with knowledge and reclaim control over your health, one compelling chapter at a time. This book promises not just information, but a paradigm shift in how you perceive sugar and its impact on your well-being.

In this chapter from *The Case Against Sugar*, Gary Taubes confronts a central question: Is sugar merely a food, or does it function more like a drug? He begins by evoking potent childhood memories of sugar's allure, recalling Roald Dahl's and Michael Pollan's observations of sugar's intoxicating effect, particularly on children. Taubes then poses a thought experiment, envisioning a readily available drug that brings immediate pleasure and sustained craving, mirroring sugar's impact. The author highlights the dilemma parents face in rationing sweets, questioning if this need for control stems from a genuinely addictive substance. Taubes navigates the historical context, noting how sugar consumption has surged with increased availability and decreased cost, almost as if populations, like individuals, are powerless to resist. He acknowledges the scientific debate around sugar's addictive properties, pointing out that early nutritional studies often overlooked its psychoactive effects. Taubes references Sidney Mintz’s work, suggesting that sugar's subtle, delayed consequences have shielded it from the moral criticisms leveled against other drugs. The narrative then sweeps through history, illustrating how sugar became intertwined with other addictive substances like tobacco and caffeine, fueling empires and transforming daily life. The author paints a vivid picture of sugar as a comforting balm, especially for those whose lives lacked other pleasures, a sweetness so craved that people would sacrifice nutritious food for it. Oscar Wilde's words echo: sugar is a perfect pleasure, exquisite, yet leaving one unsatisfied. Taubes explores the evolutionary basis of our sweet tooth, questioning why this craving is so deeply ingrained, and why fats, more calorically dense, don't elicit the same response. He notes the troubling reality that even infants display a preference for sugar, and that it is used to soothe them even more effectively than a mother's embrace. The chapter culminates by examining the neurological impact of sugar, revealing how it triggers the same reward centers in the brain as addictive drugs, potentially leading to dopamine down-regulation and increased cravings. Yet, Taubes acknowledges the complexity, recognizing that sugar, unlike other drugs, is also a nutrient, and that the line between pleasure and addiction remains blurred. He cites research showing that rats, when given a choice, will often prefer sugar over cocaine, suggesting that sweets can even serve as a less harmful substitute for harder drugs. The author underscores how sugar has infiltrated every corner of our diets, often hidden in unexpected places, and how the food industry has exploited our innate cravings, masking sugar under various names. The chapter closes with a reflection on how sugar has become synonymous with love and celebration, a reward system deeply embedded in our culture, leaving us to ponder whether this transformation is simply due to its pleasing taste or a more insidious, drug-like craving that has escaped moral and health scrutiny for far too long.

In this chapter of *The Case Against Sugar*, Gary Taubes traces the long, intricate history of sugar, revealing how a once-rare delicacy transformed into a ubiquitous, often invisible, component of the modern diet. Taubes begins by noting sugar's presence in nearly all plants and recounts early attempts to extract its sweetness, from honey and maple syrup to less successful ventures like sorghum. The narrative tension arises from sugars increasing availability, which fuels an almost insatiable demand. He illuminates sugarcane's domestication in New Guinea around 10,000 years ago, initially valued for the simple sweetness of chewing its stalks. The breakthrough came with the discovery in India, around 500 B.C., of refining techniques involving heating and cooling sugarcane juice, thus creating raw sugar and molasses. Taubes underscores sugar's multifaceted utility beyond mere sweetness: its preservative qualities, its role in fermentation, and its ability to enhance flavors, a symphony of chemical reactions that make it indispensable in food preparation. Buddhist missionaries and Muslim explorers then carried sugar across continents, embedding it into diverse cultures and cuisines. The Crusades introduced sugar to Northern Europe, initially as a medicine and spice, a precious commodity trickling down from royalty to the wealthy. But the true catalyst for sugars explosion was the unholy alliance with slavery, a dark chapter where human suffering fueled the world's sweet tooth. The narrative tightens as Taubes describes the brutal labor required for sugarcane cultivation, making slaves the cruel solution to meet growing demand. Columbus's introduction of sugarcane to the New World and the subsequent rise of sugar plantations in Brazil and the Caribbean set the stage for a global industry built on exploitation. The economic and political weight of sugar from the seventeenth through the nineteenth centuries rivaled that of oil in the twentieth, driving wars, empires, and fortunes. Taubes then pivots to the twin engines of sugars final transformation: beet-sugar production and the Industrial Revolution. Beet sugar offered a temperate-climate alternative, while industrial technologies slashed production costs, the narrative gaining momentum as sugar transitioned from a luxury to a dietary staple. This shift spawned entirely new food industries, from mass-produced candies and chocolates to ice cream and soft drinks, all ingeniously marketed, especially to children. The chapter culminates with a stark realization: the very qualities that made sugar so desirable its versatility, its affordability, its addictive sweetness also paved the way for its overconsumption and potential harm, leaving us to grapple with the legacy of this complex history. The scene shifts to the modern grocery store, shelves stacked high with sugary temptations, a testament to sugars pervasive influence, a colorful, overwhelming display that masks a complex history of exploitation and innovation. The story concludes with a question, will we ever be able to resist the siren song of sweetness?

In this chapter, Gary Taubes unveils a surprising and unsettling alliance: the marriage of tobacco and sugar, revealing its profound impact on public health, particularly in the rise of lung cancer. He begins by drawing a parallel between the surge in diabetes, linked to increased sugar consumption, and the lung cancer epidemic, fueled by the proliferation of American blended cigarettes. Taubes highlights the pivotal, yet often overlooked, role sugar played in making cigarettes both palatable and addictive. He references a 1950 report, 'Sugar and Tobacco,' commissioned by the Sugar Research Foundation, emphasizing that sugar's influence on the tobacco industry is an area insufficiently explored. Before the advent of blended cigarettes, Americans primarily consumed tobacco through cigars, pipes, or chewing tobacco, methods that limited smoke inhalation. However, the introduction of Camels by R. J. Reynolds, blending different tobacco types, revolutionized the industry. The key innovation, flue-curing, involved heating tobacco leaves, resulting in a high sugar content. This process made the smoke acidic, rather than alkaline, allowing for easier inhalation without irritation. Taubes paints a vivid picture: imagine the transformation of tobacco leaves, once bitter, now infused with a sweetness that lures smokers deeper into addiction. This ease of inhalation, however, also meant that carcinogens could more readily reach the lungs, transforming healthy cells into malignant ones. Moreover, the addition of sugar-sauced Burley tobacco, a practice adopted to sweeten and reduce costs, further enhanced nicotine delivery. The author notes that as the cigarette burns, the smoke becomes more acidic, driving smokers to inhale more deeply precisely when the concentration of harmful substances is at its peak, creating a vicious cycle. Taubes suggests that the sugar industry, initially seeing the rise of cigarettes as a boon, later faced a reckoning with the surgeon general's report linking smoking to lung cancer. Ultimately, the chapter underscores the grim reality that the combination of tobacco and sugar not only propelled the cigarette industry to global dominance but also paved the way for a devastating health crisis, a legacy we continue to grapple with today.

In this chapter of *The Case Against Sugar*, Gary Taubes explores the peculiar resilience of sugar consumption, even during economic downturns. He begins with C.W. Barron's observation that vices are depression-proof investments. Taubes then echoes George Orwell’s insights from *The Road to Wigan Pier*, noting how people turn to cheap luxuries like sugar during hardship, a readily available comfort. The author reveals that sugar's demand is price inelastic, meaning that reduced prices don't necessarily decrease consumption; instead, they spur production, creating a self-perpetuating cycle. This economic reality intertwines with political influence, as sugar producers lobby for protectionist policies like import quotas and subsidies, exemplified by the U.S. Sugar Act. Taubes paints a picture of the sugar industry as a relentless force, adapting to disruptions like wars and natural disasters by expanding production and aggressively marketing to new consumers, even inducing countries like China to increase their sugar intake. Technological advancements, such as vending machines and refrigerators, further fueled sugar consumption, making sugary treats more accessible than ever. The author highlights the temporary setback of sugar rationing during World War II, quickly followed by the resurgence of sugar in the form of soft drinks, candy, ice cream, and, critically, breakfast cereals and juices. Taubes illustrates how the fruit industry successfully marketed sugar-rich juices as healthy additions to the American diet, while cereal companies, initially hesitant, succumbed to market pressures and introduced sugar-coated cereals, often rationalizing their high sugar content. Even the health food industry of Battle Creek, once champions of sugar-free flakes, eventually gave way to the allure of pre-sweetened cereals. In the end, Taubes shows how advertising, nutritional debates, and the sheer addictive appeal of sugar transformed American breakfasts into a daily indulgence, creating an insatiable demand. The chapter culminates with the understanding that the battle against sugar isn't merely a matter of personal choice but a confrontation with powerful economic and political forces.

In this exploration of sugar's early history, Gary Taubes unveils a narrative where science and societal perceptions intertwined, often to the detriment of public health. He begins by painting a picture of the late 19th and early 20th centuries, a time when sugar consumption was skyrocketing, and physicians were beginning to link it to a host of ailments, diabetes chief among them; it was a perfect storm of rising health concerns and nascent nutritional science. Yet, the tools and understanding to truly dissect sugar's impact were missing, creating a blind spot that would persist for decades. The author highlights how early nutrition science, fixated on energy balance and caloric intake, overshadowed the critical role of hormones, like insulin, in regulating fat accumulation and fuel allocation. This ninety-year head start in energy-focused thinking cemented a limited view of sugar as merely 'empty calories,' dismissing its complex metabolic effects. Taubes emphasizes that the absence of rigorous scientific methodology among American physicians of the time further compounded the issue; their opinions, often anecdotal, shaped conventional wisdom, eclipsing the more advanced research emerging from Europe. It's a stark reminder that authority, without the backing of solid science, can lead an entire field astray, especially when centers of scientific excellence were lacking in the US. Taubes then revisits historical debates, from Thomas Willis's observations of increased diabetes among the affluent to Fred Slare's vigorous defense of sugar, illustrating the persistent dilemma: is sugar a nourishing food or a dietary evil? The author notes how the ability of sugar to fatten the lean was once seen as a virtue, a stark contrast to modern concerns about obesity. As the narrative unfolds, Joslin emerges as a central figure, whose influential textbook would shape the field of diabetes for decades. Joslin, however, armed with the best intentions and nascent science, mistakenly believed all carbohydrates were equal, overlooking sugar's unique properties. This misconception, coupled with Joslin's reliance on the Japanese paradox a population with high carbohydrate intake but seemingly low diabetes rates led to the exoneration of sugar as a primary cause of diabetes, a view that would dominate American medical thought for much of the 20th century. The author reveals how Joslin, along with Himsworth in the UK, built a scientific 'house of cards,' each reinforcing the other's flawed conclusions based on incomplete data and the sugar-carbohydrate equivalence fallacy. As Joslin's influence grew, the critical examination of sugar's role in diabetes waned, setting the stage for future health crises. The central tension lies in how incomplete science, personal biases, and influential figures can steer an entire field of medicine, obscuring the truth about sugar's impact on health, a cautionary tale reminding us to question established dogmas and seek deeper understanding.

In this chapter, Gary Taubes unveils a critical juncture in nutritional science, a fork in the road where well-intentioned but ultimately misguided ideas took hold, shaping our understanding of diet and disease for decades. He begins by highlighting how, since the 1930s, nutritionists have leaned heavily on two pillars: the belief that dietary fat is the primary culprit in chronic diseases and the concept of energy balance—calories in, calories out—as the sole determinant of weight. Taubes elucidates that the focus on dietary fat emerged from observing nutrition transitions, but this hypothesis faltered when confronted with populations consuming less fat yet still experiencing increased chronic diseases. The narrative tension escalates as Taubes introduces the second pillar: the energy-balance model, which posits that weight gain is simply a matter of consuming more calories than we expend. This idea, Taubes argues, is the sugar industry's greatest defense, obscuring the unique metabolic impacts of different macronutrients. He contrasts this prevailing view with the insights of early 20th-century European researchers like Carl von Noorden, Gustav von Bergmann, and Julius Bauer, who challenged the simplistic notion of caloric imbalance. These researchers, now largely forgotten, posited that obesity was a hormonal regulatory disorder, a defect in the way fat cells trap and release calories. Taubes paints a vivid scene: fat cells, like rogue actors, hoarding calories regardless of overall intake. The author then reveals how the rise of Hitler and World War II effectively erased this European school of thought, allowing the energy-balance model to solidify its dominance in American medical research. Taubes underscores the significance of Rosalyn Yalow and Solomon Berson's development of radioimmunoassay in 1960, which revolutionized the measurement of hormones. Their discovery that both type 2 diabetics and obese individuals often had elevated insulin levels challenged the assumption that diabetes was solely a disease of insulin deficiency. This revelation hinted at insulin resistance as a potential driver of both obesity and diabetes, a concept that threatened the prevailing caloric-centric view. Taubes concludes by showing how the sugar industry has skillfully exploited the energy-balance model, deflecting blame by arguing that a calorie is a calorie, regardless of its source. The chapter leaves us with a profound sense of how entrenched ideas, even if flawed, can persist, especially when powerful interests are at play, a gift that keeps on giving to the sugar industry.

In this chapter of "The Case Against Sugar," Gary Taubes unveils the sugar industry's strategic playbook, a blend of marketing savvy and scientific maneuvering. Initially, the Sugar Institute emerged not from health concerns, but from a sugar glut, aiming to boost consumption and stabilize prices, painting sugar as a health food through targeted ads. As Taubes explains, World War II brought a turning point; nutritionists highlighted sugar's empty calories, leading to government campaigns that demonized sugar during rationing, a bitter pill sugar executives resented. Post-war, the Sugar Research Foundation (SRF) was born, a defensive measure to rehabilitate sugar's image by funding research, a strategy that mirrors the tobacco industry's tactics. Taubes reveals that the SRF, later the Sugar Association Inc. (SAI), strategically distributed grants to prominent researchers, influencing studies on dental health and obesity. As dental caries became linked to sugar, the SAI funded research to deflect blame, suggesting broader carbohydrate restrictions instead, a move to protect sugar's reputation, and advised brushing after meals as the primary solution. When obesity became a national concern, the SAI combatted the rise of artificial sweeteners, launching campaigns to defend sugar's role in a balanced diet, leveraging assumptions about calorie consumption and hunger. Taubes notes a pivotal moment: the industry's attack on artificial sweeteners like cyclamates and saccharin, using the Delaney clause to raise cancer concerns and eliminate competition, showcasing a willingness to manipulate scientific findings for market dominance. The narrative tension peaks with the FDA's involvement, swayed by industry-funded research and public pressure, leading to bans and restrictions, though later overturned. Ultimately, Taubes leaves us contemplating the long-term consequences of these campaigns, the tainting of artificial sweeteners, and the sugar industry's success in maintaining its market share, a cautionary tale of influence and public perception.

In “Defending Sugar,” Gary Taubes unveils the sugar industry's strategic response to mounting scientific evidence linking sugar consumption to chronic diseases. The narrator sets the stage by introducing John Tatem, Jr., president of the Sugar Association, who in 1976, framed sugar as a vital nutrient, battling the enemies who baselessly accused it of causing every ailment known to man. Taubes highlights how Tatem dismissed prominent nutritionists like Walter Mertz, John Yudkin, and Jean Mayer as purveyors of nutritional rubbish, seeking to discredit their warnings about sugar's harmful effects. The author reveals the Sugar Association's successful efforts to suppress dissenting voices, exemplified by their takedown of Jean Mayer's article in Readers Digest, illustrating the industry's commitment to defending its lifeblood—the unquestioned safety of sugar. Taubes underscores the industry's triumph in shaping public opinion and influencing public health authorities for decades, leading to increased sugar consumption despite rising obesity and diabetes rates. The narrative tension rises as Taubes questions the ethical implications of defending a product when faced with ambiguous research suggesting potential harm, pointing out that the industry chose public relations over scientific inquiry, delaying crucial research for over twenty years. The scene shifts to the rise of the dietary-fat hypothesis, guided by Ancel Keys, a figure whose research, funded by the sugar industry, ironically steered nutrition research away from sugar. Taubes exposes Keys's influential role in promoting the idea that dietary fat, particularly saturated fat, was the primary culprit in heart disease, a belief that would dominate nutritional dogma for decades. The author then introduces John Yudkin, who, armed with a Darwinian perspective, challenged the prevailing fat-centric view, arguing that sugar was the prime suspect in the rise of obesity, diabetes, hypertension, and heart disease. Taubes recounts Yudkin's experiments and observations linking sugar intake to metabolic abnormalities, bolstered by studies from Israel and South Africa documenting diabetes epidemics in populations with increased sugar consumption. The narrative reaches a critical point as Taubes details the Sugar Association's efforts to undermine Yudkin's research and promote its own agenda, enlisting figures like Fred Stare to defend sugar and discredit its critics. Taubes concludes by revealing the Sugar Association's successful campaign to influence government reports and dietary guidelines, effectively exonerating sugar and shifting the focus to fat as the primary dietary evil, leaving the audience to reflect on the long-term consequences of prioritizing industry interests over public health.

In this chapter of *The Case Against Sugar*, Gary Taubes explores the complex interplay between scientific inquiry, public health policy, and the pervasive influence of dietary dogma. He begins by underscoring the scientific method's reliance on testable hypotheses, a process often stymied in nutrition science by the decades-long timelines required to observe chronic disease development. The narrative tension escalates as Taubes recounts the NIH's controversial embrace of the low-fat diet in 1984, a decision propelled by a leap of faith rather than definitive evidence. This decision, visualized as a ship setting sail into a fog-laden sea, guided by hope more than a clear map, had far-reaching consequences. He notes that the requirements of public health policy and rigorous science can be mutually exclusive, leading to premature declarations and the defense of entrenched beliefs even when evidence suggests otherwise. John Yudkin recognized this conflict decades earlier, emphasizing the limitations of available research on sugar and chronic disease, and the difficulty of conducting long-term human trials. The chapter highlights how the consensus that diabetes was caused by obesity, not sugar, led to the acceptance of the idea that a calorie is a calorie, despite emerging evidence that different macronutrients are metabolized differently. The story takes a turn as the glycemic index emerges, paradoxically casting sugar in a favorable light and contributing to increased consumption of fructose-containing sweeteners, which the corn refiners promoted it as something other than sugar. Later, the narrative thread shifts towards the growing understanding of insulin resistance and metabolic syndrome. Gerald Reaven's work connected these conditions to carbohydrate intake, challenging the prevailing focus on dietary fat. Taubes paints a picture of the medical community grappling with this new information. The chapter moves towards a resolution as researchers began to study sugar's impact on fatty liver disease (NAFLD), uncovering the liver's role in converting fructose into fat, a process linked to insulin resistance and metabolic syndrome. Yet, Taubes acknowledges the limitations of existing studies, most of which are short-term and rely on high doses of sugar. Despite mounting evidence, uncertainty persists, fueled by industry influence and the inherent difficulties of conducting long-term human trials. The chapter concludes with the assertion that while definitive proof remains elusive, the biological mechanisms elucidated over decades make sugar a prime suspect in the development of insulin resistance and metabolic syndrome, suggesting that a leap of faith towards reducing sugar consumption might be warranted.

In this chapter of *The Case Against Sugar*, Gary Taubes unveils a troubling historical narrative, beginning with Dr. Elliott Joslin's 1940 survey on diabetes prevalence, a time when the disease was considered rare. Taubes sets the stage by highlighting the stark contrast to today's epidemic, particularly among Native American tribes like the Pima, whose rates have skyrocketed to become some of the highest in the world, a medical mystery that demands unraveling. He illuminates the critical juncture of the post-World War II era, when Western diets infiltrated Native American communities, bringing with them a surge in obesity and diabetes, a stark transformation visualized through the shift from lean figures to the increasing presence of obesity, even among children. The author explains how researchers, initially puzzled by the lack of immediate diabetic complications, eventually recognized they were witnessing a new wave of the disease, its long-term effects yet to fully manifest, a slow-motion crisis unfolding before their eyes. Taubes emphasizes the complexity of the epidemic, pointing to the interplay of genetics, dietary changes, and the alarming phenomenon of perinatal metabolic programming, where high maternal blood sugar levels during pregnancy predispose children to obesity and diabetes, a vicious cycle perpetuating across generations. This intergenerational transmission becomes a central theme, illustrating how the seeds of metabolic dysfunction, once sown, can bloom with each passing generation, making the problem increasingly intractable. The narrative tension crescendos with the question of sugar's role, challenging conventional thinking that often exonerates it despite mounting evidence linking it to insulin resistance, a critical piece of the puzzle often overlooked. Taubes suggests that once a population crosses a certain threshold of sugar consumption, particularly pregnant women, the consequences may be irreversible, a point of no return in the trajectory of public health. He underscores the ADA's contradictory stance—downplaying sugar's role while simultaneously advising against sugary drinks—revealing a cognitive dissonance in the medical establishment's approach. Ultimately, Taubes leaves us contemplating whether this cycle can be broken, urging a deeper examination of sugar's impact, not just on individuals but on generations to come, a call to action to confront a looming health crisis before it spirals further out of control.

In this pivotal chapter of *The Case Against Sugar*, Gary Taubes delves into the complex web of Western diseases, drawing heavily on the work of pioneers like Hugh Trowell and Denis Burkitt, who observed a disturbing correlation between Western diets and a rise in chronic illnesses; he frames their initial observations as a product of the collective medical consciousness of the British Empire, where physicians in far-flung locales could compare notes on disease patterns. Taubes highlights how these physicians noticed that as indigenous populations adopted Western diets, they began to suffer from the same ailments plaguing Europe and the United States, like a canary in a coal mine signaling deeper systemic issues. The author emphasizes the importance of evolutionary biology in understanding these patterns, noting that rapid environmental changes, like shifts in diet, can quickly alter a population's disease profile, thus creating a tension between our genes and our rapidly changing lifestyles. Taubes then zeroes in on the Tokelau Island Migrant Study (TIMS) as a stark example of Westernization's impact, where a traditional diet high in saturated fat gave way to one laden with sugar and white flour, leading to a surge in obesity, diabetes, and heart disease, almost as if chronic diseases were silently seeding themselves in fertile ground. Taubes advocates for Occam's Razor, urging us to consider the simplest explanation for this clustering of diseases, suggesting that sugar, with its profound effects on insulin resistance and metabolic syndrome, may be the primary culprit, a single dietary trigger rather than a multitude of factors. He dissects the connection between sugar and specific ailments like gout, hypertension, cancer, and Alzheimer's, revealing how fructose, a component of sugar, elevates uric acid levels, potentially leading to gout, while insulin resistance, driven by sugar consumption, disrupts blood pressure regulation. Taubes presents compelling evidence linking elevated insulin and IGF levels to cancer, suggesting that sugar may fuel tumor growth, and he even explores the emerging research connecting Alzheimer's disease to insulin resistance in the brain, thus reframing our understanding of dementia. Ultimately, Taubes challenges the conventional wisdom that blames salt and fat, proposing that sugar's pervasive role in metabolic dysfunction makes it the prime suspect in the epidemic of Western diseases, urging a reevaluation of our dietary assumptions and a deeper investigation into sugar's impact on our health, and that perhaps the simplest explanation is the most unsettlingly true.

Gary Taubes' "The Case Against Sugar" delivers a sobering reflection on sugar's pervasive role in modern society, its historical journey from luxury to ubiquitous staple, and its detrimental impact on public health. The book unveils how cultural normalization, industry influence, and flawed science have obscured sugar's true nature, leading to widespread overconsumption and a surge in chronic diseases. Emotionally, it challenges us to confront our own sugar cravings, recognize their roots in reward systems and emotional comfort, and seek healthier alternatives. The practical wisdom lies in scrutinizing food labels, understanding the various forms of hidden sugars, and questioning established dietary dogmas. The book highlights the ethical implications of sugar's production history, particularly its link to slavery, and the industry's tactics to protect its profits at the expense of consumer well-being. Ultimately, "The Case Against Sugar" is a call to action, urging us to critically evaluate our relationship with sugar, advocate for informed policies, and prioritize public health over industry interests. The lessons learned extend beyond individual dietary choices, prompting a broader reflection on the interplay between science, industry, and public health, and the need for rigorous, unbiased research to guide our understanding of nutrition and disease.