۱۸-۱- Introduction to personalized nutrition: “One size does not fit all”

۱۸-۲- Genes, nutrients, and nutraceuticals in athletic performance

۱۸-۳- Phytonutritional epigenomics: Role of phytonutrients in athletic performance

۱۸-۴- Conclusion

References

Abstract

In sports nutrition, the use of genetic information to personalize a nutritional regime seems to be useful to maximize athletic performances. The genetic variability between individuals can affect physical properties (muscle strength, skeletal structure, heart and lung size, tendon elasticity) but also nutrients absorption, distribution, metabolism, and excretion. Despite genetic testing for predicting sports performance and talent identification being continuously on the rise in the market, nutrigenetic/nutrigenomic aspects are less known and applied. This is due to the complexity in the identification of associations of different polymorphisms in nutrition, especially because every polymorphism can affect directly or indirectly different other genes, proteins, or metabolic pathways. In this chapter, we analyze the latest advances on the application of nutrition and genetics in sport, from scientific evidence on the role of macro- and micronutrients in sports performance, to the application of phytonutritional epigenomics in the field and future perspectives.

Introduction to personalized nutrition: “One size does not fit all”

Since ancient times, nutrition has always been considered an essential condition for maintaining good health. Hippocrates of Kos, the father of medicine, said in 460 BC: “Let food be thy medicine and medicine be thy food.” His observations led to associative evidence between diet and health by highlighting how food is able to interfere with our body’s physiology by not only acting as an energy provider, but as a modulator of the health/disease balance in a different way for each individual (Tsiompanou and Marketos, 2013) depending on the personal characteristics. Somehow it can be considered a precursor of modern nutritional genomics. It is fundamental to consider that although nutrients act by modulating some physiologic functions in a dose-dependent manner, each individual responds differently depending on its genotypic and phenotypic characteristics (Ferguson et al., 2016). Therefore, the recommended daily doses suggested by the international nutrition guidelines, based on studies on large populations rather than specific genotypes or phenotypes, should be used with enough flexibility to account for the plethora of genetic, epigenetic, and environmental factors contributing to health and disease in each individual.