FN 225: Nutrition
Teresa McFerran, M.S., R.D.
Health Professions Division
Lane Community College
Eugene, Oregon

LECTURE 1A

Please also read Chapter 1 in your text book

CORRECTIONS/ADDITIONS/HIGHLIGHTS:

I find that viewing these lectures works best with the following browsers:

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Most of the clips you will be watching for this class are of my colleague Beth Naylor.  She is a nutrition instructor who has been teaching at lane for 35 years.  She developed this course so is seen in most of the video clips.
 

During Week 1, start to keep track of what you eat for 3 days.  You will be entering these food records into a diet analysis program and be submitting reports Week 2. There are instructions under Week 1 of Moodle on how to get started with this.

FORUM QUESTION:

  1. Briefly introduce yourself by telling us where you were born and how long you've lived in the town where you live now.  Also, what is your favorite food?

NOTE:    If you do not want e-mail copies of the forums sent to your personal e-mail account you have to unsubscribe from the forum. You can do this by clicking on the check mark next to "Discussion subscription" to uncheck it when you are in the forums.

Make sure you've printed the lecture outline for Week 1 from Moodle before viewing this lecture.  You will want to fill in the lecture outline while viewing the lectures for this week.  You will use the lecture outlines to help answer study questions and to help prepare for exams.  I suggest putting the lecture outlines in a 3-ring binder to create a "packet" or "workbook".

You SHOULD NOT print this online lecture!

LECTURE 1A: Chapter 1- Linking food, function, and health
(Note: Skip the section in the text book called How much of each nutrient do most people need, pages 14-17, for now. We will cover this in Week 2.)

Begin by looking at how this LECTURE OUTLINE is organized.
 LECTURE 1B will continue with Week 1.

III Identifying Valid Nutrition Info in the News: Scientific Research

 IV Identifying Nutrition Info that is unreliable (not valid) or that should make you suspicious

V 4 Guidelines for Evaluating Nutrition Info on the Web
(from the LCC library)
I'm hoping that these Lectures help you understand the material, not only to help you be successful on tests, but also to deepen your understanding so you'll remember it even after the course is over.


 

I The Science of Nutrition
A.    Definition of a "Nutrient"
A chemical substance in food that is required by the body to

provide energy, give the body structure and/or help it work.

USING THE ABOVE DEFINITION, which of the following is a nutrient- carrots, vitamin A or both __________

Click here if you think the answer is carrots.

Click here if you think the answer is vitamin A.

Click here if you think the answer is both.

The 6 categories (types) of nutrients for humans:
1.  carbohydrates (sugar, starch, fiber)
2.  lipids (triglycerides, sterols, phospholipids)
3.  proteins
4.  water
5.  vitamins
6.  minerals

Which of these categories do you think should be first?
Click here if your answer would be water.

 Click here if your answer would be protein.

Click here if your answer would be one of the other categories.

The categories of nutrients that have energy that humans can use are (1) carbohydrates (starch and sugar but not fiber), (2) fats and (3) proteins.  We call these the energy-yielding nutrients. 


B.    MACRONUTRIENTS (not exactly described this way in our text):
1.    carbohydrates (sugar, starch, fiber)
2.    lipids (triglycerides, sterols, phospholipids)
3.    protein
4.    water

 Which of these macronutrients can be broken apart to yield energy for the human body? (see above)
C.    MICRONUTRIENTS: vitamins and minerals
1.    Vitamins. 

Vitamins A, E, D, K and C are examples of vitamins. Also, there are 8 B-complex vitamins and they are thiamin, riboflavin, niacin, pantothenic acid, biotin, folate, B12 and B6.

2.    Minerals. 

Examples of minerals include calcium, potassium, sodium and iron.

Neither vitamins nor minerals can be broken apart to yield energy for the human body, although vitamins DO have energy.  More about this later.  

D.    Is a potato a carbohydrate? _________Why or why not?

Click here if you think the answer is Yes.

Click here if you think the answer is No.


Why is it NOT accurate to call a potato a carbohydrate?

You should now be able to answer this.


E.    What is the definition of a nutrient?

Use the definition at the start of this lecture.
F.    Definition of an organic nutrient-

A nutrient (or substance) containing carbon to carbon bonds which can be broken apart (also called burned) to release energy.  (A bond is a link between two elements.)  

Organic nutrients are nutrients that can be made by living organisms, in a sense they are “alive”, and therefore can be destroyed or broken down.


An element is a substance that can't be separated into smaller parts. Examples of elements include carbon, hydrogen, iron and calcium.

Here is the Periodic Table of all the elements:
On the Periodic Table below, find the following elements:

carbon [C]
hydrogen [H]
oxygen [O]
iron [Fe].






Glucose (shown below) is an organic substance because it has carbon atoms bonded to other carbon atoms which can be broken apart to release energy.


A MOLECULE OF GLUCOSE

Is CO2 an organic substance? Use the definition above (definition of an organic nutrient) to answer this.
[CO2 (carbon dioxide) is a combination of one atom of carbon bonded to 2 atoms of oxygen.]

Click here if you think CO2 is an organic substance.
Click here if you think CO2 is NOT an organic substance.

Why or why not? You should be able to answer this now.  Post a question in the Student Questions forum if you're still confused.

Four of the 6 categories (the ones in a green font) of nutrients are organic.
1.  carbohydrates (sugar, starch, fiber)
2.  fats
3.  proteins
4.  water
5.  vitamins
6.  minerals


The vitamins in our food ARE organic and contain energy. Why can't our bodies release this energy that is in vitamins?

One reason we can NOT release the energy in vitamins is that we don't want to! Releasing the energy in vitamins would require breaking the vitamins apart.  Then we would not have vitamins available to do for us what we need them to do, such as help us heal (vitamin C) or see (vitamin A).

So we don't make the enzymes needed to break apart vitamins.




Photomicrograph of Vitamin C

by Michael W. Davidson, 1990
Center for Materials Research & Technology
and Institute of Molecular Biophysics
The Florida State University, Tallahassee

A colleague, the chemistry instructor Gary Mort, said that pictures like the above are taken with plane polarized light. The crystals act as diffraction gratings and since they are at different angles, the crystals show up as different colors. Many organic molecules can do this.

G.    Definition of an inorganic nutrient-

A nutrient without a carbon to carbon bond and it cannot be broken apart to release energy.  Inorganic nutrients are not created, nor are they destroyed.

Which of the 6 categories of nutrients are inorganic?  Water and minerals.  These are inorganic nutrients that plants get from the soil to grow and thrive (they can't synthesize them since they are inorganic).  The other nutrients (carbohydrates, proteins, fats, and vitamins) plants can synthesize since they are organic.



Above is another look at the Periodic Table of the Elements.

Why is vitamin A considered organic while iron is considered inorganic?


 

As you can see with the image above, vitamin A has many carbon atoms bonded to other carbon atoms so it is organic.  Iron, on the other hand, is a single element.  See if you can find iron (Fe) on the T-shirt above.

Your Turkey Cheese Frank fell into the barbecue and is now nothing but ash. Which of the six categories of nutrients is this ash composed of? Answer: The ash is composed of minerals.

What did the carbohydrates, proteins, fats & vitamins become? Answer: All of these are organic and they burned up and became:
1.    heat
2.    carbon dioxide (which went into the air)
3.    water (which evaporated)

H.    Definition of a Calorie (kcal)- kilocalories are used to measure the energy in foods.  It is a unit of heat and is a measure of how much energy (or potential heat) is in a food. The word "Calories" (capital C) is for our purposes the same thing as the word "kilocalorie" and we will use them interchangeably.
 


After viewing the information below, you should be able to answer the question in your lecture outline, "If a hot dog has 20 grams of fat, how many Calories are coming from fat in the hot dog?"  If you  are not sure how to answer this, post a question in the Student Questions forum.

Fat has 9 Calories per gram
Protein has 4 Calories per gram
Carbohydrate has 4 Calories per gram


(A gram is about the weight of a paper clip.)





This 1912 cookbook is by Fannie Merritt Farmer.  Notice below how food was classified.  
Which of the 6 categories of nutrients was missing back in 1912?



(Definition of placebo- NOT a real treatment but it might induce body's natural healing process from the ACT of treatment, not a treatment itself.) 

Consider the following: 500 women were divided into 2 groups. One group took 1200 mg of calcium a day and the other took a placebo. After 3 menstrual cycles, the calcium group reported a nearly 50 percent drop in 4 major PMS symptoms: mood swings, pain, water retention and food cravings. The placebo group saw a 30% decrease (Newsweek, Special Issue)

        Why is this an example of the placebo effect?

It is an example of the  placebo effect because BOTH groups saw improvement, even the group receiving the placebo.


For the next section, read the following article.  It will help you fill in some blanks in your Lecture Outline.

Brody, H. (2000, August). Tapping the Power of the Placebo. Newsweek.  Retrieved from http://www.newsweek.com/tapping-power-placebo-159099




    What is the definition of a "quack remedy"?
  1. A quack remedy has unproven claims for benefits
  2. exaggerated beyond what you'd see with a placebo. 
  3. There is probably intentional deception in order to 
  4. make money.
  5. There is potential for harm.
  6. And the benefits are likely temporary.
    What is the difference between a quack remedy and the placebo effect?

A placebo effect is not exaggerated, deceptive, money-making or harmful, but the benefits ARE likely temporary.  It is something that is documented during research to determine if a treatment is more effective than a placebo treatment.  


Here is Beth's husband warming up in front of her gas stove and he thinks he IS warming up.  But you'll notice that he is receiving a placebo benefit because the stove is NOT ON.  

Just standing there induced his body to do activities that made him feel warm, like increasing circulation.  But it's definitely temporary.

This is the end of Lecture 1A.  Also watch Lecture 1B during week 1.

































Incorrect. Carbon dioxide has just one carbon atom, so it is NOT considered organic.  An organic nutrient (or an organic substance) contains carbon atoms bonded to carbon atoms which can be broken apart (also called burned) to release energy.
Click here to return to the Lecture.




































Incorrect.  Carrots are NOT a nutrient.  They are a FOOD that contains the nutrient vitamin A, as well as a number of other nutrients, including fiber and potassium.
Click here to return to the Lecture.

Nutrient category to be first- There is not a correct answer to this.  Many people cite water because such a large part of out bodies is water and we would die within days of being totally without it.  But ALL categories of nutrients are essential to us and being totally without any of the nutrients would eventually lead to death.
Click here to return to the Lecture.
















































Correct.  Vitamin A IS a nutrient.  It is a chemical substance in food that is required by the body to help it work.
Click here to return to the Lecture.











































Incorrect.  Vitamin A IS a nutrient. It is a chemical substance in food that is required by the body to help it work.  
But carrots are NOT a nutrient.  They are a FOOD that contains the nutrient vitamin A, as well as a number of other nutrients, including fiber and potassium.
Click here to return to the Lecture.




















































Incorrect.  Potatoes are NOT a carbohydrate, which is a nutrient.  They are a FOOD that contains carbohydrates, mainly the carbohydrates starch & fiber.  Potatoes also have a number of other nutrients, including vitamin C and potassium.
Click here to return to the Lecture.












































Correct.  Potatoes are NOT a nutrient.  Potatoes are a FOOD that contains carbohydrates, mainly the carbohydrates starch & fiber.  Potatoes also have a number of other nutrients, including vitamin C and potassium.
Click here to return to the Lecture.














































Correct.  Carbon dioxide is NOT considered organic.  An organic nutrient (or an organic substance) contains carbon atoms bonded to carbon atoms which can be broken apart (also called burned) to release energy.
Click here to return to the Lecture.