Floyd “Ski” H. Chilton, PhD

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Professor, Nutritional Sciences
Associate Director, BIO5 Institute
Director, Precision Nutrition and Wellness Initiative
Biography
Dr. Chilton is widely recognized for his work on nutrition in the context of variation in the human genome and has been a pioneer in the areas of personalized or precision nutrition and wellness. He currently is the Director of the Precision Nutrition and Wellness Initiative. Specifically, his lab examines how genetic and epigenetic variations interact with human diets (especially the modern Western diet) to drive inflammation and inflammatory disorders (including cardiovascular disease and cancer), as well as psychiatric/developmental disorders. These precision-, individualized- and population-based approaches provide a wide range of opportunities to benefit health and enhance wellness and disease prevention throughout the life span.
Cancer Focus
Dr. Chilton currently has research grants, on-going studies, and collaborations in four major cancer-related areas including: 1) Gene-diet interactions that drive racial ethnic disparities in prostate and colon cancer; 2) Lifestyles and related molecular mechanisms that augment cancer prevention and enhance wellness; 3) Metabolomic and lipidomic analysis to identifymolecular networks associated with prostate and colon cancer development and aggressiveness; and 4) Development of biomarkers that can predict present and future cancer status for the individual.
Selected Publications
Chilton, F. H., R. Dutta, L. M. Reynolds, S. Sergeant, R. A. Mathias, and M. C. Seeds, "Precision Nutrition and Omega-3 Polyunsaturated Fatty Acids: A Case for Personalized Supplementation Approaches for the Prevention and Management of Human Diseases.", Nutrients, vol. 9, issue 11, 2017 Oct 25. PMCID: PMC5707637 PMID: 29068398
Cui, T., A. G. Hester, M. C. Seeds, E. Rahbar, T. D. Howard, S. Sergeant, and F. H. Chilton, "Impact of Genetic and Epigenetic Variations Within the FADS Cluster on the Composition and Metabolism of Polyunsaturated Fatty Acids in Prostate Cancer.", Prostate, vol. 76, issue 13, pp. 1182-91, 2016 09. PMID: 27197070
Hester, A. G., R. C. Murphy, C. J. Uhlson, P. Ivester, T. C. Lee, S. Sergeant, L. R. Miller, T. D. Howard, R. A. Mathias, and F. H. Chilton, "Relationship between a common variant in the fatty acid desaturase (FADS) cluster and eicosanoid generation in humans.", J Biol Chem, vol. 289, issue 32, pp. 22482-9, 2014 Aug 08. PMCID: PMC4139254 PMID: 24962583
Chilton, F. H., R. C. Murphy, B. A. Wilson, S. Sergeant, H. Ainsworth, M. C. Seeds, and R. A. Mathias, "Diet-gene interactions and PUFA metabolism: a potential contributor to health disparities and human diseases.", Nutrients, vol. 6, issue 5, pp. 1993-2022, 2014 May 21. PMCID: PMC4042578 PMID: 24853887
Mathias, R. A., S. Sergeant, I. Ruczinski, D. G. Torgerson, C. E. Hugenschmidt, M. Kubala, D. Vaidya, B. Suktitipat, J. T. Ziegler, P. Ivester, et al., "The impact of FADS genetic variants on ω6 polyunsaturated fatty acid metabolism in African Americans.", BMC Genet, vol. 12, pp. 50, 2011 May 20. PMCID: PMC3118962 PMID: 21599946