Foodomics Database: A New Tool for Precision Medicine and the ‐omic Toolbox

Abstract

BackgroundFoodomics is an emerging –omic approach to obtain food molecular profiles. Release 28 of the USDA National Nutrient Database for Standard Reference (SR28) contains data for up to 150 food molecules and is a source of foodomics data, but SR28 is not reflective of the changing marketplace directly accessed by consumers. Nutrition Facts Labels (NFLs) for brand specific foods in the marketplace reflect current nutrient information but usually contain less than 15 nutrients. The best method to determine food molecular profiles is to apply analytical techniques to food before consumption, but this is resource intensive. An alternative approach is to estimate food molecular profiles by integrating up‐to‐date information in NFLs and SR28. A foodomics database that integrates current NFLs and SR28 is needed to obtain foodomic profiles of a person's (or animal's) dietary intake and, therefore, implement precision medicine for each person.ObjectiveCreate a foodomics database that integrates current NFLs and SR28 to obtain food molecular profiles for brand specific foods.MethodsPhotographs of NFLs for brand specific foods were taken in Florida grocery stores in 2015, uploaded to a Qualtrics survey, and data in NFLs were entered and audited in a database. Carbohydrate was estimated by using the higher value of 1) gram weight on the NFL or 2) Calories remaining after subtraction of fat and protein Calories from total Calories. The ratio of NFL nutrients (e.g. saturated fat (g)) to the same nutrient in SR28 was defined as “NFL factor”. The following methods were used to integrate NFLs and SR28: 1) When NFL data were available, NFL data directly replaced SR28 data, 2) When NFL data were unavailable (e.g. C16:0) but were part of an NFL nutrient group (e.g. saturated fat (g)), the nutrient group NFL factor was used to impute the missing food molecule (e.g. total saturated fat factor to impute C16:0), 3) When NFL data were unavailable, SR28 data were used.ResultsNFLs for 1,709 brand specific foods were collected from local grocery stores in 2015. The foodomics database contains up to 150 molecules per gram weight of food for 1,709 brand specific foods and 8,789 foods from SR28. The foodomics database is updated annually.ConclusionThe foodomics database facilitates discovery‐based and hypothesis‐driven studies that integrate food molecular profiles with data from other high‐resolution phenotyping datasets to unravel the myriad effects of diet on health in a wide variety of nutritional and non‐nutritional perturbations. These methods will pave the way for nutrition to be a vital part of precision medicine so that the right food molecules are given in the right amount, at the right time, and to the right person.Support or Funding InformationThis work supported in part by the NIH/NCATS Clinical and Translational Science Award to the University of Florida UL1 TR000064