PreMiEr Affiliate Lawrence David Co-Authors Study on Wastewater and Diet
PreMiEr Affiliate Dr. Lawrence David co-authored a new study using wastewater analysis to identify community diet patterns across North Carolina, offering a low-cost alternative to traditional nutrition surveys.
Dr. Lawrence David, a PreMiEr Affiliate at Duke University, was a senior author on a new study published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences exploring what wastewater can reveal about community diets. Working with co-senior author Dr. Rachel Noble of UNC-Chapel Hill, the research team analyzed wastewater samples from 2.1 million people across North Carolina, searching for fragments of food DNA that survive digestion. The approach, which builds on wastewater surveillance methods developed during the Covid-19 pandemic, identified hundreds of foods people had consumed and revealed dietary patterns linked to rurality, affluence, and immigrant populations in different communities. The study points to wastewater as a low-cost, scalable alternative to traditional diet surveys, though researchers note it still faces challenges in distinguishing between related foods and accounting for signal degradation in aging sewer infrastructure.
Read the full article here: The Future of Nutrition Research May Run Through the Sewer