My foodflask app for Data Incubator Project Proposal

Data Incubator Project Proposal

My plots describe the high selenium content and high fiber content in Breakfast Cereals, Baked Products and Cereal Grains and Pasta.
Go here to visualize my plots: high fiber and high selenium

Aim of Project

In this last decade, we saw a drastic decrease of essential nutrient deficiencies, many infectious diseases have been defeated, and the majority of the U.S. population can now have a extensive and productive life. Nevertheless, as infectious disease rates decreased, the rates of chronic diet-related diseases due in part to changes in lifestyle behaviours. Bad eating habits and physical activity patterns have a cumulative effect and have contributed to significant nutrition- and physical activity-related health challenges that now face the U.S. population. About half of all American adults have one or more preventable chronic diseases, which are usually related to bad eating habits and physical inactivity. These include cardiovascular disease, high blood pressure, type 2 diabetes, some cancers, and poor bone health.
To prevent these diseases a consumer need to eat food rich in the nutrient or compounds lacking.
For example it has been shown that intake of dietary fiber and whole grain is inversely related to obesity, type two diabetes, cancer and cardiovascular disease (CVD) (Lattimer & Haub, 2010). Selenium is nutritionally essential for humans, is a constituent of more than two dozen selenoproteins that play critical roles in reproduction, thyroid hormone metabolism, DNA synthesis, and protection from oxidative damage and infection (Sunde RA, 2012).
To help consumers, it could be a good idea to create an application where they can food which food is rich in the nutrient needed, so my project aims to create this application.
From the National Nutrient Database for Standard Reference of the USDA, I used the API and selected Breakfast Cereals, Baked Products and Cereal Grains and Pasta foods and their nutrient values to search food rich in fiber and selenium.

• Lattimer, J. M., & Haub, M. D. (2010). Effects of dietary fiber and its components on metabolic health. Nutrients, 2(12), 1266-1289. doi: 10.3390/nu2121266
• Sunde RA. Selenium. In: Ross AC, Caballero B, Cousins RJ, Tucker KL, Ziegler TR, eds. Modern Nutrition in Health and Disease. 11th ed. Philadelphia, PA: Lippincott Williams & Wilkins; 2012:225-37