Lorraine Brennan

University College Dublin | UCD

Scope The study assesses the metabolic impact of dietary whey proteins across generations. Method and results Virgin females are fed 20% energy whey proteins with 70% energy carbohydrates, which reduces body weight gain and visceral adipose compared to controls fed dietary casein. In contrast, the males are unresponsive. The effect is accentuated...

The protein-I project is a cross Ireland initiative that takes a food systems approach to enhancing the sustainability of protein production across the island of Ireland, as part of the protein-I project, this study aims to produce a smart agricultural supply chain solution. There is a need for the requirements of the system to be tailored for the...

Background: The capacity of an individual to respond to changes in food intake so that postprandial metabolic perturbations are resolved, and metabolism returns to its pre-prandial state, is called phenotypic flexibility. This ability may be a more important indicator of current health status than metabolic markers in a fasting state. Aim: In th...

Resistance to neoadjuvant chemoradiation therapy is a significant clinical challenge in the management of rectal cancer. There is an unmet need to identify the underlying mechanisms of treatment resistance to enable the development of biomarkers predictive of response and novel treatment strategies to improve therapeutic response. In this study, an...

Simple Summary Oesophageal adenocarcinoma (OAC) is a poor prognosis cancer with limited response rates to current treatment modalities and is strongly linked to obesity status and metabolic dysfunction. This study for the first time has conducted a detailed assessment of adipose tissue metabolism, as well as assessing adipose secreted pro-inflammat...

There is a need to transform our current food system if we are to feed the rapidly expanding global population while maintaining planetary health. Within the island of Ireland, there is an urgent need to diversify the foods that currently contribute to our populations' protein intake. A Shared Island Innovative Food System approach is required to a...

Purpose High-fat and low-fibre discretionary food intake and FTO genotype are each associated independently with higher risk of obesity. However, few studies have investigated links between obesity and dietary patterns based on discretionary food intake, and the interaction effect of FTO genotype are unknown. Thus, this study aimed to derive dietar...

Insulin secretion following ingestion of a carbohydrate load affects a multitude of metabolic pathways that simultaneously change direction and quantity of interorgan fluxes of sugars, lipids and amino acids. In the present study, we aimed at identifying markers associated with differential responses to an OGTT a population of healthy adults. By us...

Background Psychotic experiences (PEs) are associated with an increased risk of future psychotic and non-psychotic mental disorders. The identification of biomarkers of PEs may provide insights regarding the underlying pathophysiology. Methods The current study applied targeted lipidomic approaches to compare plasma lipid profiles in participants...

Recent developments in biomarker discovery have demonstrated that combining biomarkers with self‐reported intake data has the potential to improve estimation of food intake. In this article, statistical methods for combining biomarker and self‐reported food intake data are discussed. The calibration equations method is a widely applied method that...

Metabolomics is increasingly applied to investigate diet-disease associations in nutrition research. However, studies of metabolite reproducibility are limited, which could hamper their use within epidemiologic studies. The objective of this study was to evaluate the metabolite reproducibility during 4 months in a free-living population. In the A-D...

Introduction High-fat diet (HFD)-induced obesity impairs clearance of cholesterol through the Reverse Cholesterol Transport (RCT) pathway, with downregulation in hepatic expression of cholesterol and bile acid transporters, ABCG5/8 and ABCB11, and reduced high-density lipoprotein (HDL) cholesterol efflux capacity (CEC). Within the current study we...

Background Metabolomic biomarkers offer potential for objective and reliable food intake assessment, and there is growing interest in using biomarkers in place of or with traditional self-reported approaches. Ongoing research suggests that multiple biomarkers are associated with single foods, offering great sensitivity and specificity. However, cur...

Lipid bioactivity is a result of direct action and the action of lipid mediators including oxylipins, endocannabinoids, bile acids and steroids. Understanding the factors contributing to biological variation in lipid mediators may inform future approaches to understand and treat complex metabolic diseases. This research aims to determine the contri...

Genes, sex, age, diet, lifestyle, gut microbiome, and multiple other factors affect human metabolomic profiles. Understanding metabolomic variation is critical in human nutrition research as metabolites that are sensitive to change versus those that are more stable might be more informative for a particular study design. This study aims to identify...

Introduction: Carbohydrate intake and physical activity are related to glucose homeostasis, both being influenced by individual genetic makeup. However, the interactions between these 2 factors, as affected by genetics, on glycaemia have been scarcely reported. Objective: We focused on analysing the interplay between carbohydrate intake and phys...

Background Early applications of metabolomics in nutrition and health research identified associations between dietary patterns and metabolomic profiles. Twin studies show that diet-related phenotypes and diet-associated metabolites are influenced by genes. However, studies have not examined whether diet–metabolite associations are explained by gen...

Scope The objectives are to develop a metabolomic‐based model capable of classifying individuals into dietary patterns and to investigate the reproducibility of the model. Methods and Results K‐means cluster analysis was employed to derive dietary patterns using metabolomic data. Differences across the dietary patterns were examined using nutrient...

Locally advanced rectal cancer is treated with neoadjuvant-chemoradiotherapy, however only 22% of patients achieve a complete response. Resistance mechanisms are poorly understood. Radiation-induced Bystander Effect (RIBE) describes the effect of radiation on neighbouring unirradiated cells. We investigated the effects of ex vivo RIBE-induction fro...

Background: Targeted nutrition is defined as dietary advice tailored at a group level. Groups known as metabotypes can be identified based on individual metabolic profiles. Metabotypes have been associated with differential responses to diet, which support their use to deliver dietary advice. We aimed to optimise a metabotype approach to deliver t...

A person's dietary intake consists of multiple foods eaten as part of a meal as opposed to any one single food/nutrient. Therefore, it is important to understand the interactions between foods and how they affect diet-disease associations. As a result, dietary patterns have emerged as important tools in nutrition research. The objective of the curr...

Metabolomic based approaches have gained much attention in recent years due to their promising potential to deliver objective tools for assessment of food intake. In particular, multiple biomarkers have emerged for single foods. However, there is a lack of statistical tools available for combining multiple biomarkers to infer food intake. Furthermo...

Scope There is an increased interest in developing biomarkers of food intake to address some of the limitations associated with self‐reported data. The objective was to identify biomarkers of apple intake, examine dose‐response relationships and agreement with self‐reported data. Methods and results Metabolomic data from three studies were examine...

Little is known about who would benefit from internet-based personalised nutrition (PN) interventions. This study aimed to evaluate the characteristics of participants who achieved greatest improvements (i.e. benefit) in diet, adiposity and biomarkers following an internet-based PN intervention. Adults (n=1607) from seven European countries were re...

Meat, including fish and shellfish, represents a valuable constituent of most balanced diets. Consumption of different types of meat and fish has been associated with both beneficial and adverse health effects. While white meats and fish are generally associated with positive health outcomes, red and especially processed meats have been associated...

Scope: Fish intake has been reported to associate with certain health benefits; however accurate assessment of fish intake is still problematic. The objective of this study was to identify fish intake biomarkers and examine relationships with health parameters in a free-living population. Methods and results: In the NutriTech study, 10 participa...

Background/objectives: Cereal foods are major contributors to the daily energy, protein, and dietary fiber intake all over the world. The role of cereals in human health is dependent on whether they are consumed as refined or whole grain and on cereal species. To unravel the underlying mechanisms of health effects attributed to specific cereal foo...

Background: Measurement error associated with self-reported dietary intake is a well-documented issue. Combining biomarkers of food intake and dietary intake data is a high priority. Objectives: The objective of this study was to develop calibration equations for food intake, illustrated with an application for citrus intake. Further, a simulati...

Clustering of adherence to personalised dietary recommendations and changes in healthy eating index within the Food4Me study – CORRIGENDUM - Volume 22 Issue 11 - Katherine M Livingstone, Carlos Celis-Morales, Jose Lara, Clara Woolhead, Clare B O’Donovan, Hannah Forster, Cyril FM Marsaux, Anna L Macready, Rosalind Fallaize, Santiago Navas-Carretero,...

Introduction: This study tested the hypothesis that providing personalized nutritional advice and feedback more frequently would promote larger, more appropriate, and sustained changes in dietary behavior as well as greater reduction in adiposity. Study design: A 6-month RCT (Food4Me) was conducted in seven European countries between 2012 and 20...

Novel metabolomic profiling techniques combined with traditional biomarkers provide knowledge of mechanisms underlying metabolic health. Twin studies describe the impact of genes and environment on variation in traits. This study aims to identify relationships between traditional markers of metabolic health and the plasma metabolomic profile using...

Oesophageal adenocarcinoma (OAC) is an exemplar model of obesity-associated cancer. Response to neoadjuvant chemoradiotherapy (NA CRT) is a clinical challenge. We examined if visceral adipose tissue and obesity status alter radiosensitivity in OAC. The radioresistant (OE33R) and radioresponsive (OE33P) OAC isogenic model was cultured with adipose t...

Purpose: Milk proteins and/or their hydrolysates have been reported to have beneficial effects for improving postprandial glycaemia. Gastric emptying is a major determinant of postprandial glycaemia, yet limited studies have examined the effects of intact milk proteins compared to hydrolysates on gastric emptying. We investigated gastric emptying...

Background The identification of early biomarkers of psychotic experiences (PEs) is of interest as early diagnosis and treatment of those at risk of future disorder is associated with improved outcomes. The current study investigated early lipidomic and coagulation pathway protein signatures of later PEs in subjects from the Avon Longitudinal Study...

Background: Dietary modifications can contribute to improved pancreatic β cell function and enhance glycemic control. Objectives: The objectives of this study were as follows: 1) to investigate the potential of milk protein hydrolysates to modulate postprandial glucose response; 2) to assess individual responses; and 3) to explore the inter- and...

A significant body of evidence demonstrates that isoflavone metabolites are good markers of soy intake, while research is lacking on specific markers of other leguminous sources such as peas. In this context, the objective of our current study was to identify biomarkers of pea intake using an untargeted metabolomics approach. A randomized cross-ove...

Following publication of the original article [1], the authors reported a spelling error of the third author’s name, Mar Garcia Aloy.

There is a growing interest in assessing dietary intake more accurately across different population groups, and biomarkers have emerged as a complementary tool to replace traditional dietary assessment methods. The purpose of this study was to conduct a systematic review of the literature available and evaluate the applicability and validity of bio...

The life sciences are currently being transformed by an unprecedented wave of developments in molecular analysis, which include important advances in instrumental analysis as well as biocomputing. In light of the central role played by metabolism in nutrition, metabolomics is rapidly being established as a key analytical tool in human nutritional s...

Aim Proteomics has the potential to enhance early identification of beta-cell dysfunction, in conjunction with monitoring the various stages of type 2 diabetes onset. The most routine method of assessing pancreatic beta-cell function is an oral glucose tolerance test, however this method is time consuming and carries a participant burden. The objec...

List of pathways related to the disposition index. Pathways obtained from pathway statistics using PathVisio software, using the curated WikiPathways directory. Sorted by number of differentially expressed proteins in pathway. P-value is permuted. Percentage of total gene products refers to % coverage of pathway by SOMAscan assay. (DOCX)

Scatterplots of proteins related to Disposition Index from Pearson’s correlation analysis (p ≤ 0.01). Protein concentrations displayed in relative fluorescence units (RFU’s). (DOCX)

The receiver operating characteristic curve analysis to assess the predictive ability of ability of the protein panel (17 proteins associated with the disposition index (p ≤ 0.01)), age, BMI, waist to hip ratio and fasting glucose, for classification of low and high disposition index values of MECHE participants (n = 30). Par scaling was used and r...

IL-17 signalling pathway obtained from WikiPathways displaying proteins significantly associated with beta-cell function measures. Green filled square: Up-regulated with increasing beta-cell functionRed filled square: Down-regulated with increasing beta-cell functionYellow Filled square: Measured but no association (DOCX)

Cell viability of BRIN-BD11 cells following treatment with different concentrations of IL-17F for 20 h (n = 4). Values are expressed as mean ± SD. No significant differences were observed. Sodium azide is the negative control. (DOCX)

Pearson’s correlation of proteins with beta-cell function/HOMA-IR. Results obtained from Pearson’s correlation analysis, with correlation coefficients and p ≤ 0.05 presented. (DOCX)

Linear regression analysis to determine a proteomic signature related to beta-cell function measures. Results obtained from stepwise linear regression analysis, with unstandardised beta coefficients and 95% confidence intervals. IL-17F; interleukin 17F, CRTAM; cytotoxic and regulatory t-cell adhesion molecule. (DOCX)

Pearson’s correlation of proteins with the disposition index. Results obtained from Pearson’s correlation analysis, with correlation coefficients and p ≤ 0.05 presented. (DOCX)

List of pathways related to beta-cell function/HOMA-IR. Pathways obtained from pathway statistics using PathVisio software, using the curated WikiPathways directory. Sorted by number of differentially expressed proteins in pathway. P-value is permuted. Percentage of total gene products refers to % coverage of pathway by SOMAscan assay. (DOCX)

Baseline characteristics FHI cohort (n = 45). All values are means ± standard deviation. BMI, Body Mass Index; BP SYS, Systolic Blood Pressure; BP DIA, Diastolic Blood Pressure; HOMA-IR, Homeostatic Model Assessment of Insulin Resistance; BCF/HOMA IR, beta-cell function adjusted by HOMA IR. (DOCX)

The receiver operating characteristic curve to assess the predictive ability of the protein panel (22 proteins associated with the beta-cell function/HOMA-IR (p ≤ 0.01)), age, BMI, waist to hip ratio and fasting glucose, for classification of low and high beta-cell function/ HOMA-IR values of MECHE participants (n = 30). Par scaling was used and ra...

SOMA data.xlsx. The SOMA data used in the study. Each row represents an individual. (XLSX)

The objective was to evaluate differences in macronutrient intake and to investigate the possible association between consumption of vegetable protein and the risk of overweight/obesity, within the Food4Me randomised, online intervention. Differences in macronutrient consumption among the participating countries grouped by EU Regions (Western Europ...

Background: The metabolome of any given biological system contains a diverse range of low molecular weight molecules (metabolites), whose abundances can be affected by the timing and method of sample collection, storage, and handling. Thus, it is necessary to consider the requirements for preanalytical processes and biobanking in metabolomics rese...

PurposeTo report the vitamin D status in adults from seven European countries and to identify behavioural correlates. Methods In total, 1075 eligible adult men and women from Ireland, Netherlands, Spain, Greece, UK, Poland and Germany, were included in the study. ResultsVitamin D deficiency and insufficiency, defined as 25-hydroxy vitamin D3 (25-OH...

Biomarkers of food intake (BFIs) are a promising tool for limiting misclassification in nutrition research where more subjective dietary assessment instruments are used. They may also be used to assess compliance to dietary guidelines or to a dietary intervention. Biomarkers therefore hold promise for direct and objective measurement of food intake...

Health has been defined as the capability of the organism to adapt to challenges. In this study, we tested to what extent comprehensively phenotyped individuals reveal differences in metabolic responses to a standardized mixed meal tolerance test (MMTT) and how these responses change when individuals experience moderate weight loss. Metabolome anal...

The application of metabolomics in nutrition epidemiology holds great promise and there is a high expectation that it will play a leading role in deciphering the interactions between diet and health. However, while significant progress has been made in identification of putative biomarkers more work is needed to address the use of the biomarkers in...

Evidence exists to support the role the dairy derived proteins whey and casein in glycaemic management. The objective of the present was use a cell screening method to identify a suitable casein hydrolysate and to examine its ability to impact on glycaemia related parameters in animal models and in humans. Following screening for ability to stimula...

Nutritional data reduction methods are widely applied in nutrition epidemiology in order to classify individuals into meaningful groups with similar dietary patterns. To date, none of the existing studies have applied latent class analysis to examine dietary patterns which include meal types consumed throughout a day. We investigated main meal patt...

Identification of new biomarkers of food and nutrient intake has developed fast over the past two decades and could potentially provide important new tools for compliance monitoring and dietary intake assessment in nutrition and health science. In recent years, metabolomics has played an important role in identifying a large number of putative biom...

Background/objectives: To identify predictors of obesity in adults and investigate to what extent these predictors are independent of other major confounding factors. Subjects/methods: Data collected at baseline from 1441 participants from the Food4Me study conducted in seven European countries were included in this study. A food frequency quest...

Scope: This study examined to what extent plasma linoleic acid (LA) is modified by adiposity, and explored any association between plasma LA, demographics, dietary intakes, markers of metabolic health and haplotypes of the fatty acid desaturase (FADS) 1/2 genes. Methods and results: 820 participants with fasting blood samples from Irish National...

Background Dietary advice is a standard component of treatment for pregnant women with impaired glucose tolerance (IGT) and gestational diabetes (GDM), yet few studies report glycemic profiles in response to dietary therapies and the optimal dietary approach remains uncertain. AimTo assess changes in maternal glycemic profile and pregnancy outcomes...

Diet-quality scores (DQS), which are developed across the globe, are used to define adherence to specific eating patterns and have been associated with risk of coronary heart disease and type-II diabetes. We explored the association between five diet-quality scores (Healthy Eating Index, HEI; Alternate Healthy Eating Index, AHEI; MedDietScore, MDS;...

Nutrigenetic research examines the effects of inter-individual differences in genotype on responses to nutrients and other food components, in the context of health and of nutrient requirements. A practical application of nutrigenetics is the use of personal genetic information to guide recommendations for dietary choices that are more efficacious...

Biomarkers are an efficient means to examine intakes or exposures and their biological effects and to assess system susceptibility. Aided by novel profiling technologies, the biomarker research field is undergoing rapid development and new putative biomarkers are continuously emerging in the scientific literature. However, the existing concepts for...

Background National guidelines emphasize healthy eating to promote wellbeing and prevention of non-communicable diseases. The perceived healthiness of food is determined by many factors affecting food intake. A positive perception of healthy eating has been shown to be associated with greater diet quality. Internet-based methodologies allow contact...