Biography
Joycelyn A.M. Peterson, (Dr.Joy) is a registered dietitian, presently professor and chair of Nutrition and Dietetics, Department and Dietetic Internship Director at Oakwood University, Huntsville, Alabama and was associate professor, chair of the Department of Family and Consumer Sciences at University of the Southern Caribbean (USC), Trinidad and Tobago, West Indies for over 5years. Her professional experience includes nutrition consultant, nutrition educator, public health speaker and in-service trainer for hospital staff and community agencies, program planner for international and state-wide public health nutrition initiatives, teaching and conducting research at the undergraduate and graduate levels. Grant writer receiving over $ 2 million from private funding. She is founder/director of the Vegetarian Institute of Nutrition and Culinary Arts (nonprofit) and Dimensions in Food and Nutrition, Inc. (for profit). She is a contributing writer for newspapers and health magazines and has also published three books and many articles. Dr. Peterson completed Nutrition and Dietetics degrees at New York Institute of Dietetics (A.S.), Oakwood University, B.S., Loma Linda University (M.P.H., Dr. P.H.), and Johns Hopkins University (post-master’s studies in international nutrition). Joy recently had her dissertation for her doctoral thesis published in the Annuals of Nutrition Metabolism, August, 2011. She continues to conduct nutrition, health, and vegetarian cooking seminars internationally. Her long-term goal is to provide dietetic and nutrition research and leadership training where ever God leads.
Research Interest
Vegetarian nutrition consultant, public health speaker, and program planner for international and state-wide public health nutrition initiatives, conducting research at the undergraduate and graduate levels.
Biography
Adelia Bovell-Benjamin is currently a Professor of Food and Nutritional Sciences in the Department of Food and Nutritional Sciences, College of Agriculture, Environment and Nutrition Sciences (CAENS), Tuskegee University, Alabama, U.S.A. At the University of California, Davis, Bovell-Benjamin earned a PhD in Nutrition with a Designated Emphasis in International Nutrition and a minor in Epidemiology. She also holds a M.S and B.S. degrees in Nutritional Science and Food and Nutrition from Queens and Brooklyn Colleges of the City University of New York, respectively. She holds postdoctoral certificates in Measuring Health Disparities, Leadership Development, and Qualitative Research from the University of Michigan, University of Georgia, and Burke Institute, respectively. Dr. Bovell-Benjamin has held several positions internationally and nationally – at the University of the West Indies, Trinidad and Tobago; as a Community/Public Health Nutritionist in Tobago; as teacher at all levels of the school system in Trinidad and Tobago; and as a clinical dietitian in New York. Her research focuses on product development (emphasis on sweetpotato), sensory science; and diet and nutrition issues, the food environment and cancer prevention in African Americans. She has worked extensively with the sweetpotato in terms of postharvest technology, cultural aspects, sensory and nutritional aspects. She has also written extensively on the sweetpotato.
Research Interest
International nutrition lipid oxidation Food product development with emphasis on sensory science Nutritional, dietary and cancer prevention issues among African Americans

Claudia Ivonne Ramírez Silva
Doctor
Center for Nutrition and Health Research
United States
Biography
Ivonne Ramirez, has a degree in Nutrition from the Metropolitan Autonomous University – Campus Xochimilco (UAM-X), a Master on Nutrition and Ph.D. on Population Nutrition Sciences, from the School of Public Health of Mexico (ESPM). In 2015, her doctoral thesis received distinction as "The best thesis in public health" of that year. She is a science researcher at the Center for Nutrition and Health Research of the National Institute of Public Health, member of the National System of Researchers, awarded level I. Current active member of the College Professoriate on the postgraduate on nutrition, and adjunct coordinator of the Doctorate in Population Nutrition Sciences of the ESPM; and member of the technical group on breastfeeding in the state of Morelos. She has participated in the National Nutrition Surveys of Mexico since 1999 to 2016; on impact assessments of governmental programs such as "Oportunidades”, now called “Prospera" carried out by the National Institute of Public Health; and on the Federal Policy on nutrition and supply of Mexico. Now a days, she is conducting two research projects each with one study cohort, assessing different early-life determinants related to development of obesity and metabolic disorders in childhood.
Research Interest
Her subjects of interest in research are: Maternal and child nutrition, childhood obesity, breastfeeding and complementary feeding, as well as the evaluation, magnitude and distribution of the population dietary intake.