Advancing the science of human nutrition

Professor Richard Flavell CBE FRS

Ceres

Richard Flavell is a plant geneticist who has focused much attention on traits important in crop plants. In the last five years he has served as Chief Scientist in two companies in the USA. The first, Indigo, Cambridge, Massachusetts is an agricultural microbiome company. The second, Inari, is an agricultural plant genetics company.

He is currently a consultant for companies and public sector organizations committed to plant improvement, including the International Wheat Yield Partnership.

After his undergraduate degree in microbiology and his PhD in the John Innes Institute and the University of East Anglia, he spent two years of postdoctoral research in Stanford University, California. He then joined the Plant Breeding Institute in Cambridge (UK) where he built up a large Department of Plant Molecular Genetics between 1969 and 1987. He was then appointed as Director of the John Innes Centre (JIC), Norwich and to a chair at the University of East Anglia and oversaw a large expansion of JIC’s activities and impact.

In 1998 he became the Chief Scientific Officer of Ceres, a young plant genomics company in California. This became a public company and was recently bought by a multinational agricultural company.

He is a Fellow of the Royal Society and a Commander of the British Empire for services to science.

Dr Andrew Morgan

Independent biosciences consultant

Andrew is an independent consultant in health, nutrition and biosciences innovation. His current roles include Royal Society Entrepreneur in Residence in the Faculty of Health & Life Sciences at the University of Exeter and Chair of Innovate UK KTN Microbiome Innovation Advisory Board. He has over 40 years of experience with global science-based companies including holding the role of Chief Scientist to DuPont Nutrition & Health and legacy Danisco businesses (2008 to 2019). He is a former DuPont Fellow and recipient of the Lavoisier Medal Award for Lifetime Technical Achievement.

He has had a strong interest in host-microbial interactions in plant, animal and human hosts. He was involved in and led discovery R&D over this period including the development of microbiome modulating bioproducts for human and livestock health and nutrition. He has been Chair and/or a member of various public and private sector boards including Chair of the Biosciences KTN, a member of the Governing Body of the BBSRC Institute of Food Research and an adviser to several UK- and EU-based biotech start-ups.

Professor Cathie Martin MBE FRS

John Innes Centre and University of East Anglia, UK

Cathie is a group leader at the John Innes Centre and Professor at the University of East Anglia. Her interests span from fundamental to applied plant science. She researches the relationship between food and health and how crops can be fortified to improve diets and address the global challenge of escalating chronic disease. This work has involved linking leading clinical and epidemiological researchers with plant breeders and metabolic engineers to develop scientific understanding of how diet can help to maintain health, promote healthy ageing and reduce the risk of chronic disease. Cathie is also involved in genetic screens to identify crops that lack toxins that cause nutritional diseases and has recently initiated a collaborative project with China to research Chinese medicinal plants.

Cathie was Editor-in-Chief of The Plant Cell (2008-2014) and is now an Associate Editor for Plant Physiology. She is a member of EMBO, AAAS, a Fellow of the Royal Society and in 2013 she was awarded an MBE for services to Plant Biotechnology.

Dr Sarah Berry

King's College London, UK

Sarah Berry is a Reader in Nutritional Sciences at King’s College London and Chief Scientist at ZOE Ltd. Her research interests relate to the influence of dietary components on cardiometabolic disease risk, with particular focus on personalised nutrition, postprandial lipid metabolism and food and fat structure. Since commencing her research career at King’s, she has been the academic leader for more than 30 human nutrition studies in cardio-metabolic health.

As the Chief Scientist at ZOE Ltd, she leads the PREDICT programme of research, assessing the genetic, metabolic, metagenomic, and meal-dependent effects on metabolic responses to food in over 100,000 people. This research is at the forefront of developments in personalised nutrition and is forging a new way forward in the design and implementation of large-scale remote nutrition research studies integrating novel technologies, citizen science and AI.

Sarah is also co-host of the free weekly ‘ZOE Science & Nutrition’ Podcast (No 1 in all UK Podcasts; May 2023), with over 10 million downloads, where she translates the latest evidence-based research across a variety of topics into useful advice for the general population.

Professor Richard Flavell CBE FRS

Ceres

Richard Flavell is a plant geneticist who has focused much attention on traits important in crop plants. In the last five years he has served as Chief Scientist in two companies in the USA. The first, Indigo, Cambridge, Massachusetts is an agricultural microbiome company. The second, Inari, is an agricultural plant genetics company.

He is currently a consultant for companies and public sector organizations committed to plant improvement, including the International Wheat Yield Partnership.

After his undergraduate degree in microbiology and his PhD in the John Innes Institute and the University of East Anglia, he spent two years of postdoctoral research in Stanford University, California. He then joined the Plant Breeding Institute in Cambridge (UK) where he built up a large Department of Plant Molecular Genetics between 1969 and 1987. He was then appointed as Director of the John Innes Centre (JIC), Norwich and to a chair at the University of East Anglia and oversaw a large expansion of JIC’s activities and impact.

In 1998 he became the Chief Scientific Officer of Ceres, a young plant genomics company in California. This became a public company and was recently bought by a multinational agricultural company.

He is a Fellow of the Royal Society and a Commander of the British Empire for services to science.