Michael La Frano April 11 2023 seminar

April 11

Nutritional Metabolomics: Exploring its Use for Expanding Nutrition Knowledge

Michael La Frano, PhD, RD, Director, Metabolomics & Proteomics at the Roy J. Carver Biotechnology Center, University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign.

Dr. La Frano has expertise in both untargeted and targeted metabolomics, including development of numerous LC-MS methods and data processing software. His independent research focuses on nutritional metabolomics, including assessment of dietary intake and the impact of nutritional status on health. This work will be complemented by nutritional proteomics in the future. He is an Affiliate of the Personalized Nutrition Initiative at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, as well as an Affiliate Member of the metabolomics Quality Assurance & Quality Control Consortium (mQACC).

 Dr. La Frano earned a Ph.D. in Nutrition Biology at the University of California, Davis. Subsequently, his postdoctoral fellowship role was as a pilot project scientist for West Coast Metabolomics Center (WCMC) NIH Pilot & Feasibility Project studies as part of the Lipid Mediators Core. He later became a faculty member in the Food Science and Nutrition department at California Polytechnic State University, San Luis Obispo where he was an Associate Professor prior to leaving. He also served as Director of the Cal Poly Metabolomics Service Center, which he founded in 2019. He has been a Registered Dietitian for over 15 years, completing his internship at the Loma Linda University Medical Center.