Biology II Diet and Nutrition Project

In doing this project, you will learn something about diet and nutrition, especially as it relates to your own diet. You will be asked to look up much of this information on your own rather than having it supplied in class to enable you to learn how to locate this information on your own and to make informed decisions based on available facts. This assignment will take several weeks of record-keeping to complete, so start early and plan ahead. Read through the whole assignment so you understand what’s going on before you jump in. A total of 100 points is possible. The grading criteria for this assignment are given below, and you should also refer to those as you work on the assignment. Please keep copies of all papers you turn in because I will be keeping the copies you turn in to document your progress from week to week.

1. For one week (seven days), keep a food journal. Record everything you eat and what time you ate it. Remember to include things like candy, pop, beer, vitamin pills, etc., too. For packaged foods, you will probably want to keep the dietary information from the labels for future reference (see Step 2). Non-nutritive things like aspirin and prescription drugs need not be included. Also record general comments on how you feel (headache?, groggy?, lots of energy?) and any other insights you may have in terms of how what you are eating is affecting your body, your health (how you “feel”), and/or your mood.     (8 pt.) 
2. List all foods eaten during that week and total the number of servings for each (for example: 14 C milk, 7 oranges, 21 cans of soft drink, etc. – remember that 14 C of milk have 14 times the nutrients in 1 C of milk). To make it easier to keep track of things, sort/group the foods by listing in alphabetical order within food group categories. (put all the dairy food together, etc.).     (8 pt.) 
3. Using one or more of the resources listed below (use of the NAT Web site is suggested) or others of which you are aware, determine the actual total amounts (grams, milligrams, IU, etc., NOT PERCENT DV because %DV only applies to people in a certain age/height/weigh/sex category and not everyone) of the various nutrients in the foods you ate (remember to correctly account for the number of servings) during that week. The NAT Web site includes:
   • Calories
   • total carbohydrates
   • fiber
   • total fat
   • unsaturated fatty acids
   • monounsaturated fatty acids
   • polyunsaturated fatty acids
   • cholesterol
   • protein
   • vitamin A (retinol)
   • vitamin B₁ (thiamine)
   • vitamin B₂ (riboflavin)
   • vitamin B₃ (niacin)
   • vitamin C
   • sodium (Na)
   • potassium (K)
   • calcium (Ca)
   • phosphorus (P)
   • iron (Fe)
   so at a minimum, you should include those for an “adequate” completion of this portion of the assignment.
   Hints on using NAT If you are using the NAT Web page listed below (recommended so you don’t have to do all the calculations by hand),
   1. After you get all your foods entered, click “analyze foods”.
   2. Then, click on “display all nutrients” (It’ll pop up a message about the database being 95% complete, or something – just click “OK”).
   3. Note, if you don’t have time to finish and need to add more, later, they have an option to save a work in progress so you can return later – follow their instructions.
   4. When you get your analysis, notice there are three columns of numbers: “Total” = what was actually in the food you ate, “Rec” = the government’s recommended amount for one day, and “%Rec” = what percent of that recommended amount you got. Notice in that last column, black = higher than 100%, yellow = marginally lower, and red = too low. However, keep in mind that if you are working with a week’s-worth of food at once, you’ll need to think in terms of 700% of the recommended amount, not 100%.
   5. NAT won’t do the daily averages for you. You will need to either print out your results, then use a calculator to determine the daily averages, or save a copy of the Web page with your results to your hard drive so you can open it in your spreadsheet software and calculate the averages that way.
   However, there are several, very important nutrients not included in NAT, so if you are willing to take the time to find as many of these as you can from other sources, doing so can help both your grade and your understanding of what’s in the foods you eat. See if you can find values for:
   • sugar
   • vitamin D (calciferol)
   • vitamin E (d-a-tocopherol)
   • vitamin B₆ (pyridoxine)
   • vitamin B₁₂ (cobalamine)
   • folacin (folic acid)
   • magnesium (Mg)
   • zinc (Zn)
   • iodine (I)
   Also, just because so many people consume so much:
   • caffeine
   • aspartame
   • alcohol
   you may wish to see if you can find data on those (for example, some people might be shocked to realize the amount of caffeine they are consuming).  
   Once you get the total for each nutrient, divide each of those numbers by seven to figure your average daily intake. As noted above, if you are using NAT, you will either need to print out your results and use a calculator to figure out the daily averages, or else save a copy of the Web page to your hard drive, then open that in your spreadsheet software and add another column to calculate the averages.  
   If you have a label from a packaged food item that lists “% Daily Value,” you will have to look up the actual RDA values (required in the next step, anyway) and do a bit of math. For example, if a food reports that it has 47% DV for vitamin C, you would need to know that the “generic” RDA for vitamin C is 60 mg, then multiply 0.47 (= 47%, remember?) × 60 mg = 28.2 mg of vitamin C in one serving of that food.      (12 pt.) 
4. Determine what the ideal daily amounts of each of these nutrients are for a person of your sex, age, weight, and height (pregnant? nursing?). For this, it is preferable to use the most recent sources because the Recommended Daily Allowances (RDA) are periodically revised. Note that if you used the NAT Web page to complete the previous step, you probably already have most of the information you need for this step! Spend some time researching and thinking about what’s best for you, because, for example, the U.S. government’s RDA for vitamin C is only 60 mg, yet many nutritionists claim that we should be getting at least 1 g, maybe even 3 to 4 g per day. In a lab experiment that our Biology 112 students do, each person is asked to consume 2 g (2000 mg) of vitamin C, then measure how much of that is excreted during the next 8 hr (vitamin C is not stored, so it’s “use it or lose it”), and most healthy people only excrete about 500 mg, suggesting that they retain and use around 1500 mg, far above the government’s RDA of 60 mg. Compare your average daily intake to these values and determine where you are low (not enough zinc?), high (too much sodium?), or OK. You will also need to research and think about which highs/lows are OK and which are not. For example, high sodium is probably not OK, while high vitamin C probably is OK, and while low fat might be OK for some people, low thiamine probably isn’t. However, to use vitamin C as an example, again, while the RDA is only 60 mg and some nutritionists recommend as much as 1 to 3 or 4 g, ingestion as much as 5 to 10 g by a healthy person might cause diarrhea, the first sign of a vitamin C “overdose”, so you do also need to be aware of those limits.     (12 pt.) 
   At this point, assuming you are a registered student and want credit for this assignment, you need to SUBMIT YOUR WORK for this first part of the project.  
5. Now, using these resources, plan a week of meals that will give you 100% of all of the above nutrients – a balanced diet (and yes, that means you do have to do the calculations). To pick on vitamin C as an example, again, if the RDA is 60 mg, then that’s 100% of what you need. Thus, if you eat an orange that contains only 40 mg of vitamin C, that’s only 67% of what you need. Start from what you normally eat and substitute more nutritious foods you’re willing to eat for less nutritious ones. Keep in mind ease of preparation and your own likes and dislikes – be reasonable in your expectations. Include at least one new food item or recipe you’ve never tried before, but are willing to eat. Again, using one of the Web-based diet analysis programs or creating a computer spreadsheet can help you do this much more quickly. If, for example, you use NAT, you can plug in each day of your proposed new diet to see where you are high or low, nutritionally. NAT has features that will allow you to add or delete various food items or change the amount of something, and as I recall, even has a feature to “suggest foods” that are good sources of nutrients of which you might need more, so you can “tweak” your new diet until it’s just right. Whatever you turn in must demonstrate that you have checked to see that this new diet supplies the full RDA for each nutrient.    (16 pt.) 
   At this point, you should SUBMIT YOUR WORK for the second part of the project. 
6. Go on this new diet for one week. Keep a food journal as before, again noting what and when you ate as well as general comments on how you feel.     (10 pt.) 
7. Go back through all your notes. Given that one week is not really a long enough time for a change in diet to have any great effects, did you find any noticeable changes in how you felt from the old diet to the new? As you review your diet journals, for your own benefit, you may also wish to look for correlations between certain foods and the way you felt after eating them: for example, if every time you ate eggs, you got a headache six hours later, that could indicate an allergy.     (6 pt.)  
8. Once again,
   you should SUBMIT YOUR WORK for the third part of the project.  Along with submission of this part of the assignment, you will be asked several short-answer “essay”-type questions about the various nutrients you have been studying. These questions will be picked at random from a larger list, and thus, will be different each time the data submission Web page is loaded.  
   Thus, before you submit this part of your data, make sure you are familiar with not only the RDAs for the various nutrients, but also be able to give examples of foods are good sources of those nutrients, and know why you need those nutrients (What do they do in your body? How do they help you?). Also, be familiar with “special” nutritional needs of certain groups of people (women, men, pregnant, elderly, etc.) Are there any special factors/conditions that should be considered, such as the effects of cooking or storing food, the type of cookware used, consumption of antibiotics or antacids that could make a difference in the nutritional content or the availability of the nutrients in your food? Is it possible to overdose on any of these nutrients, and if so, what are the signs/symptoms of an overdose? Have you discovered any interesting stories about any of the nutrients such as how/when they were discovered or that they contain “unusual” chemicals, etc? What diseases are caused by deficiencies of the various nutrients, and what are the signs and symptoms of those diseases?     (4 pt. × 7 = 28 pt.) 

Grading Criteria

1.   Diet Journal:
2  —  All required diet journal information was included for all seven days 1  —  An attempt at a diet journal was made, but the diet journal was not kept for all seven days 0  —  No diet journal data were turned in
2  —  Thorough, detailed notes and data were included 1  —  Some notes and data were included, but the diet journal is rather sketchy 0  —  Inadequate or no notes and data were included
2  —  It is obvious that the student was paying attention to and thinking about how the foods being consumed were affecting his/her body 1  —  Some thought was given to the relationship between foods consumed and effects on the person’s body 0  —  It would appear that the student spent very little time thinking about how his/her diet was affecting him/her
2  —  The student, obviously, went beyond the minimum requirements of the assignment 1  —  The student adequately completed the assignment 0  —  The student completed considerably less of the assignment than what was required
2.   List of Foods:
2  —  All food items listed in the diet journal were included here 1  —  Only some of the consumed foods were listed and/or foods were listed here that were not included in the diet journal 0  —  List of foods is missing
2  —  Totals accurately reflect total amounts consumed 1  —  Totals do not match with reported amounts consumed 0  —  Totals are missing or grossly inaccurate
2  —  Time was taken to organize the foods by food-group categories 1  —  Some attempt was made to group similar foods together 0  —  No organization to the list, related foods not grouped together
2  —  The student, obviously, went beyond the minimum requirements of the assignment 1  —  The student adequately completed the assignment 0  —  The student completed considerably less of the assignment than what was required
3.   Nutrient Analysis:
2  —  Weekly totals were included for all nutrients listed in NAT plus a number of other important nutrients 1  —  Weekly totals were included for all nutrients listed in NAT 0  —  Weekly totals were not included for all specified nutrients
2  —  All weekly totals were correctly calculated for each food, based on all the servings consumed during the week 1  —  Some weekly totals were incorrectly calculated because not all servings were included in the calculation, but most are OK 0  —  Many/all weekly totals were incorrectly calculated
2  —  Daily averages were calculated and included for all nutrients listed in NAT plus a number of other important nutrients 1  —  Daily averages were calculated and included for all nutrients listed in NAT 0  —  Some or all daily averages not calculated/included
2  —  All daily averages were correctly calculated 1  —  Some daily averages were incorrectly calculated, but most are OK 0  —  Many or all daily averages were incorrectly calculated
2  —  The student, obviously, sought out and made effective use of a variety of resources 1  —  The student made good use of NAT as a resource 0  —  It appears that the student did not take advantage of the available resources
2  —  The student, obviously, went beyond the minimum requirements of the assignment 1  —  The student adequately completed the assignment 0  —  The student completed considerably less of the assignment than what was required
4.   RDA and Comparison
2  —  Recommended values were included for all nutrients listed in NAT plus a number of other important nutrients 1  —  Recommended values were included for all nutrients listed in NAT 0  —  Recommended values were not included for all specified nutrients
2  —  Where the student’s recommended values differ from the US-RDA, it is obvious that this was intentional, based on careful research on and thought about recommendations of other nutritional experts 1  —  The student accepted the US-RDA values (as suggested in NAT) as his/her personal, recommended values 0  —  Where the student’s recommended values differ from the US-RDA, this seems to be due to inadequate research to determine what the recommended values are
2  —  An analysis of the nutritional highs/lows/OKs was included for all nutrients listed in NAT plus a number of other important nutrients 1  —  An analysis of the nutritional highs/lows/OKs was included for all nutrients listed in NAT 0  —  An analysis of the nutritional highs/lows/OKs was inadequate or missing
2  —  The high/low/OK selections suggest that the student spent a lot of time thinking about and analyzing the significance of his/her nutritional data 1  —  The high/low/OK selections suggest that the student correctly compared his/her nutritional intake numbers to the RDA values 0  —  The high/low/OK selections suggest that the student did not grasp the significance of his/her nutritional intake numbers
2  —  The student, obviously, sought out and made effective use of a variety of resources 1  —  The student made good use of NAT as a resource 0  —  It appears that the student did not take advantage of the available resources
2  —  The student, obviously, went beyond the minimum requirements of the assignment 1  —  The student adequately completed the assignment 0  —  The student completed considerably less of the assignment than what was required
5.   New Diet Plan and Nutrients:
2  —  A week’s-worth (seven days) of menu plans were included 1  —  Four to six days’-worth of menus were included 0  —  Three or less days’-worth of menus were included
2  —  Daily amounts obtained were calculated and included for all nutrients listed in NAT plus a number of other important nutrients 1  —  Daily amounts obtained were calculated and included for all nutrients listed in NAT 0  —  Some or all daily amounts not calculated/included
2  —  All daily totals were correctly calculated 1  —  Some daily totals were incorrectly calculated, but most are OK 0  —  Many or all daily totals were incorrectly calculated
2  —  All menu plans for all days are designed to supply 100% of all nutrients 1  —  A few menu plans are slightly lacking in a few nutrients 0  —  Either amounts of many nutrients are not specified or many nutrients are seriously lacking for many of the days
2  —  The menus suggest that the student spent a lot of time thinking about and attempting to meet his/her nutritional needs 1  —  The menus suggest that the student correctly compared his/her planned nutritional intake to the RDA values 0  —  The menus suggest that the student did not grasp the significance of his/her nutritional needs
2  —  Several new food/menu items are included 1  —  At least one new food/menu item is included 0  —  No new foods are included
2  —  The student, obviously, sought out and made effective use of a variety of resources 1  —  The student made good use of NAT as a resource 0  —  It appears that the student did not take advantage of the available resources
2  —  The student, obviously, went beyond the minimum requirements of the assignment 1  —  The student adequately completed the assignment 0  —  The student completed considerably less of the assignment than what was required
6.   New Diet Journal:
2  —  All required diet journal information was included for all seven days 1  —  An attempt at a diet journal was made, but the diet journal was not kept for all seven days 0  —  No diet journal data were turned in
2  —  Thorough, detailed notes and data were included 1  —  Some notes and data were included, but the diet journal is rather sketchy 0  —  Inadequate or no notes and data were included
2  —  It is obvious that a conscious effort was made to follow the diet plan and obtain 100% of all nutrients 1  —  A number of unplanned “substitutions” were made that resulted in less-than-adequate nutrition 0  —  Many unplanned “substitutions” were made, to the point that the planned diet was not followed at all, resulting in poor nutrition
2  —  It is obvious that the student was paying attention to and thinking about how the foods being consumed were affecting his/her body 1  —  Some thought was given to the relationship between foods consumed and effects on the person’s body 0  —  It would appear that the student spent very little time thinking about how his/her diet was affecting him/her
2  —  The student, obviously, went beyond the minimum requirements of the assignment 1  —  The student adequately completed the assignment 0  —  The student completed considerably less of the assignment than what was required
7.   Summary and Comments:
2  —  Thorough, detailed notes and comments were included 1  —  Some notes and comments were included, but rather sketchy 0  —  Inadequate or no notes and comments were included
2  —  It is obvious that the student was paying attention to and thinking about how the foods being consumed were affecting his/her body 1  —  Some thought was given to the relationship between foods consumed and effects on the person’s body 0  —  It would appear that the student spent very little time thinking about how his/her diet was affecting him/her
2  —  The student, obviously, went beyond the minimum requirements of the assignment 1  —  The student adequately completed the assignment 0  —  The student completed considerably less of the assignment than what was required
8.   Questions (for each question):
2  —  Answer to question was correct 1  —  Answer to question was mostly correct 0  —  Answer to question was mostly or all incorrect or missing
2  —  Answer to question was thorough and well thought-out 1  —  Answer to question was a bit vague and/or not totally logical 0  —  Answer to question was too sketchy/vague and/or did not make sense or was missing

REFERENCES:

Web resources from other places:
Thanks to the students who found and suggested many of these Web sites, and please let me know if you find other good ones. Note that clicking on any of these links will open a new window so you don’t lose your place on the Biology 105 page.

• Nutrition Analysis Tool from University of Illinois - Urbana/Champaign
• Searchable USDA Nutrient Database from Fatfree.com      (main page)
• Women and Nutrition from the FDA (has information applicable to men, too)
• Daily Values for Nutrients on Food Labels from the “Nutrition Farm”
• Recommended Dietary Allowances (RDA) from the “Nutrition Farm”
• Healthy Body Calculator from Joanne Larsen
• Nutritional Profile from CyberDiet.com
• Diet Analysis Web Page from ANET

Related information on our Web server:

• Bio 104 Carbon Compounds  – 

  The Functional Groups discussed on this page are frequently found in our bodies and our food

• Bio 114 and 111 Sugar in Soft Drinks Activity  – 

  A simple way to measure the amount of sugar in a can of soft drink

• Bio 114 and 111 Mayonnaise Activity  – 

  A recipe for mayonnaise, a classic emulsion

• Bio 111 Lab Brew Activity  – 

  A recipe to study the process of fermentation

• Bio 114 and 111 Root Beer Activity  – 

  Another recipe to study the process of fermentation – this takes less time and is a simpler procedure

• Bio 112 Sprout-Growing Activity  – 

  Directions for growing one’s own sprouts at home

• Bio 116 and 112 Salad-Making Activity  – 

  Directions for using those sprouts and a variety of other greens to make a nutritious salad

• Bio 115 and 112 Maple Sap Collecting Activity  – 

  Directions for collecting and boiling down maple sap to make syrup

• Bio 114 Enzymes Activity  – 

  An activity to illustrate various properties of enzymes

• Bio 116 and 112 Cheese- and Yogurt-Making Activity  – 

  Recipes for yogurt and cheese – see Dr. Fankhauser’s Cheese Page for more detailed information

• Bio 115 and 112 Waffle-Making Activity  – 

  A recipe for nutritious and delicious Fankhauser waffles

• Dr. Fankhauser’s Cheese Page  – 

  Lots of interesting cheese-related information

• Dr. Fankhauser’s Recipe for Cheese Using One Gallon of Milk  – 

  A recipe for basic cheese

• Dr. Fankhauser’s Recipe for Cheese Using Five Gallons of Milk  – 

  Try this if you have lots of extra milk to use up

• Dr. Fankhauser’s Homemade Yogurt  – 

  An easy recipe

• Dr. Fankhauser’s Homemade Buttermilk  – 

  Another easy recipe

• Dr. Fankhauser’s Homemade Root Beer  – 

  The original recipe for and more information on the root beer we make in lab

• Dr. Fankhauser’s Homemade Ginger Ale  – 

  Many herb books mention that ginger is good for soothing an upset stomach

• Dr. Fankhauser’s Recipe for Whole Wheat Bread  – 

  Yummy, nutritious, whole-grain bread

• Dr. Fankhauser’s General Information on Milk-Fermenting Bacteria  – 

  General information on all those hard-working bacteria

Books (definitely not an all-inclusive list!):

• Adams, Catherine and Martha Richardson. 1981. Nutritive Values of Foods. USDA, USGPO. 34 pp.      (lib # TX 551.A32)
• (anon.) 1994. A Good-Sense Guide: Guide to the Foods you Eat. Black Dog & Leventhal Publ., Inc., New York. 432 pp.      (jsc)
• Gelb, Barbara L. 1978. The Dictionary of Food and What’s in it For You. Paddington Press, New York. 253 pp.      (lib # TX 551.G28)
• McGill, Marion and Orrea Pye. 1978. The No-Nonsense Guide to Food and Nutrition. Butterick Publishing, New York. 224 pp.      (jsc)
• Pennington, Jean A. T. and Helen Nichols Church. 1985. Bowes and Church’s Food Values of Portions Commonly Used, 14th Ed. Harper & Row, New York. xxvii + 257 pp.      (or more recent edition)     (jsc)
• Robertson, Laurel, Carol Flinders, and Brian Ruppenthal. 1986. The New Laurel’s Kitchen. Ten Speed Press, Berkeley. 512 pp.      (jsc)
• Watt, Bernice K., et al. 1975. Composition of Foods: USDA Handbook of the Nutritional Contents of Foods. Dover Publ., New York. 190 pp.      (dbf), (lib # TX 551.W37)
• Wong, Dominic W. S. 1989. Mechanism and Theory in Food Chemistry. Van Nostrand Reinhold, New York. xviii + 428 pp.      (lib # TX 541.W66)

carterjs@uc.edu

Copyright © 1996 by J. Stein Carter. All rights reserved.
This page has been accessed times since 14 Mar 2001.