Nutrition is a science which studies the relationship between diet and states of health and disease. Dietitians are Health professionals who are specialized in this area of expertise. They are also the only highly trained health professionals able to provide safe, evidence-based and accurate dietary advice and interventions. Nutrition is the body of science that seeks to explain metabolic and physiologic responses to diet. With advances in molecular biology, biochemistry, and genetics, nutrition is additionally developing into the study of integrative metabolism, which seeks to connect diet and health through the lens of biochemical processes. The human body comprises chemical compounds such as water, amino acids (proteins), fatty acids (lipids), nucleic acids (DNA/RNA), and carbohydrates (e.g. sugars). These compounds in turn consist of elements such as carbon, hydrogen, oxygen, nitrogen, and phosphorus, and may or may not contain minerals such as calcium, iron, or zinc. Minerals ubiquitously occur in the form of salts and electrolytes. All of these chemical compounds and elements occur in various forms and combinations (e.g. hormones/vitamins, phospholipids, hydroxyapatite), both in the human body and in organisms (e.g. plants, animals) that humans eat.
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