Floyd “Ski” H. Chilton, PhD
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.