Diabetes is a serious disease affecting over 27 million Americans. If the current projections continue, that number could triple by 2050, according to CDC scientists. Diabetes occurs when a person’s insulin production either shuts down (type 1 diabetes) or insulin and the body’s cells no longer work together as efficiently as they should (type 2 diabetes).  In both cases the result is that glucose, the fuel that the body uses to supply cells with energy, can not enter the cells. This leads to excess glucose in the blood, causing the condition known as high blood sugar.   There is a third type of diabetes, gestational diabetes, which can develop during pregnancy. People with type 1 diabetes need insulin to help balance their blood sugars.  People with type 2 diabetes can often balance their blood sugars adequately with oral medicines.  Both forms of diabetes require a healthy diet and... Read more

It is common knowledge that genetics plays an important role in the risk for obesity. However, recent research highlights another important aspect of a predisposition to becoming overweight or obese: namely the nutritional status of mothers during pregnancy and nursing. Read more

Most people are familiar with the little number on the bottom of recyclable plastic bottles. However not everyone knows what those numbers mean about the materials used in the packaging. Many polymers can be used to produce rigid packaging but poly(ethylene terephthalate) — known as PET — is the primary plastic material used to produce bottles for beverages, such as carbonated soft drinks, water or juices. That’s because of PET’s excellent clarity, moderate gas barrier, and good recycling, mechanical and sensorial performance. In order to differentiate the most commonly used plastic packaging materials present on the market and help recyclers facilitate the recovery of post-consumer plastics, the Society of Plastics Industry (SPI) introduced a resin identification coding system called “SPI code” in 1988. At that time, six resins had been considered the most used plastics in producing rigid packaging, and a number from 1 to 6 was assigned.... Read more

Co-Authored by Tara Acharya, Senior Manager, Global Health Policy, PepsiCo // Undernutrition is one of the world’s most serious and least addressed global health and development problems. As a global food and beverage company, PepsiCo believes it can play an important role in reducing the human and economic costs of the issue. Women and children are undernutrition’s biggest victims and, along with other development challenges, undernutrition causes an estimated 3.5 million preventable maternal and child deaths a year.  Folate deficiency, which contributes to premature birth, low birthweight and neural tube defects in infants, plays a crucial role in undernutrition. The human body requires folate to manufacture erythrocytes, synthesize DNA, and to regulate normal growth. The recommended daily intake for young women is 400 mg. Poor overall nutrition and lack of access to folate-enriched food products present a critical barrier to women in developing countries. As part of the... Read more

Last week, PepsiCo sponsored the American Dietetic Association’s annual Food & Nutrition Conference in Boston, an event that drew more than 10,000 food and nutrition experts to engage in discussions about global nutrition. By bringing together leading dietitians, nutrition science researchers, policy makers, health care providers and food companies, events like this hold significant potential for the advancement of public health. Read more

Morgan Brennan talks about, “CEO Indra Nooyi’s new vision for the industry’s leading corporation,” in this 2:35 minute video on Forbes.com. Ms. Brennan interviews PepsiCo’s Derek Yach for the piece. You can see the entire video here. Read more

Taste receptor technology recently landed at PepsiCo in the form of a development agreement with Senomyx Corp. (SNMX), a biotechnology company that is a leader in applying taste receptor technology to real-world solutions.  As PepsiCo’s primary expert in taste receptor research, I’d like to start the discussion on taste receptor technology and how it will transform our collective future. Detecting environmental nutrients and toxins are one of the most fundamental and primordial biological functions. Life evolved a host of mechanisms to communicate chemical information from the environment to elicit cellular responses that provide an advantage in avoiding or seeking the chemical signatures of foods, mates, toxins, etc. The proteins involved in sensing are the super family called G protein Coupled Receptors or GPRCs. Even photosynthetic bacteria have a GPCR called bacteriorhodopsin that capture a photon of light and cause the bacteria to swim toward the light source.... Read more

Last week, several colleagues and I attended TEDMED in San Diego. It was my first time at the conference and, as you'll see in the video below, I enjoy conferences like TEDMED because I believe that I have never stopped being a student. I went to San Diego to listen, learn, and meet as many people as possible. At TEDMED you get the latest ideas and cutting edge thinking from a variety of different disciplines. Read more