Peeling back the potato: at the intersection of food insecurity and cardiometabolic disorders
Date
2022
Authors
Bagheri Toulabi, Sahar, author
Prenni, Jessica, advisor
Stromberger, Mary, committee member
Gentile, Christophe, committee member
Holm, David G., committee member
Journal Title
Journal ISSN
Volume Title
Abstract
According to the Centers for Disease Control (CDC), cardiometabolic diseases (CMD) such as cardiovascular disease and diabetes are the leading cause of death in the United States, which in turn, are strongly linked to obesity. Diet composition is known to be a primary contributing factor in the development of obesity, in the end promoting systemic chronic inflammation and CMD. Unfortunately, providing nutritious and affordable foods to Americans is still a challenge. This highlights the urgent need for additional research in both agriculture and nutrition, to provide sustainable, affordable, and high-quality foods which meet basic caloric and micronutrient needs. In recent years, much emphasis has been placed on phytochemicals due to their promising role in alleviating the pathophysiology of CMD. Phenolics have been proven to have direct health impacts such as increasing the antioxidant capacity of serum, reducing inflammatory biomarkers, ACE inhibitory, and improving arterial health. Our research focused on the potato as it is a superior food choice for both health and nutrition per dollar. The explorations in this dissertation were conducted through multidisciplinary groups to evaluate the different aspects of potatoes, potential health benefits, and barriers to entry. Purple flesh genotypes showed the most antioxidant (AOX) activity, and the highest ACE inhibitory potential in-vitro. Importantly the observed variation within other market classes shall provide a great opportunity to improve these cultivars for the different sections of industry, beyond the fresh market. Beyond the bioactivity of the phytochemicals in-vitro, we examined the effect of a whole potato (a high phenolics cultivar) diet on obesity and the subsequence pathophysiology. We observed that the high phenolic potato diet increased satiety in obese, leptin-deficient (ob/ob), mice. The obese mice on the purple potato diet also lost weight when compared to the obese with the control diet. The same trend was observed in the lean animal model (+/ob) who had the purple potato diet for 10 weeks. As a consequence of eating less, adiposity is reduced in both obese and lean animals. These observations were corroborated by a non-targeted metabolomics study of serum and liver in obese and lean animals, who had potato diet or control. Clear segregation was observed between the metabolites fingerprints between potato diet group compared to control diet. Reduction in serum cholesterol and liver triacylglycerol of the obese animal who had the potato diet was very promising. In our last research, we sought the potato growers' decision-making process to adopt new cultivars or not. Each year, growers must decide in which cultivar to grow, and therefore this decision has an impact on the availability of a cultivar to consumers. This decision can be considered vital to public health as these cultivars are demonstrated to vary in traits important to human health. Adopting a new approach (either using new technology or adopting a new crop) brings risk to the system and is therefore associated with complex psychological and economic factors. We develop a multi-factorial model to explain adoption in a potato-growing system. Growers that were more aware of specialty cultivar innovation and associated consumer demand were more open to SCs adoption. Other influencing factors include a grower's experience selling a specialty cultivar in the previous year and access to diverse markets. Our model demonstrates that the current barriers to adoption are access to primary buyers such as warehouses, retailers, and households. Taken together, this research demonstrates how rational expectations stem from economic outcomes, knowledge, and experience in the potato industry. These results are important in helping to consider opportunities for growers to access new, higher-value markets, which may also improve consumer access to nutritious cultivars.