IGP:
Gerontology

Mentor / Lab:
Dr. Regan L. Bailey

Specific Research Area / Project:
Identifying nutritional risk of vulnerable U.S. population

Undergraduate Institution:
Seoul National University, South Korea

Research Profile:

Nutrition is a modifiable factor that influences health. My research field, nutritional epidemiology, characterizes how dietary exposures are related to health. Dietary exposures are very difficult to measure largely because people do not remember and/or report everything they consumed and how much they had. Therefore, Dr. Regan L. Bailey and our lab members have been working on improving the methods to measure nutritional status.

Specifically, I've been working on identifying nutritional risk among a vulnerable U.S. subpopulation. The project presented at the OIGP Spring Reception 2019 was about comparing the nutritional status of overweight and obese older adults to their healthy-weight counterparts using a nationally representative sample of community-living U.S. older adults. To accurately capture nutritional status, we assessed dietary quality, usual nutrient intake from all sources (food sources and dietary supplements), and nutritional biomarkers. Our analysis indicates that obese older adults had lower dietary quality as well as similar or higher risks of micronutrient inadequacy compared to healthy-weight older adults. The findings suggest that obesity may coexist with micronutrient inadequacy (i.e., over-fed and under-nourished) in older adults, although not well recognized. Unique nutritional risks identified from our research could provide guidance on where to focus public health efforts to prevent nutritional risk and lessen the burden of associated diseases in the aging population.

About Me:

At first, I chose nutrition science just because it looked fun; I always liked having good foods and watching cooking shows. However, I became more and more serious about nutrition as I learn the importance of "what we eat" in our health and well-being. After college, I joined the Master of Public Health program to learn more about nutritional epidemiology and moved to Purdue to pursue a Ph.D. in the Interdisciplinary Nutrition Program. At Purdue, I was so excited to find the gerontology program (the Center on Aging and the Life Course, CALC) that offers a dual-title Ph.D. As everyone is aging, I hoped to work on optimizing the aging experience with adequate nutrition. I especially appreciated CALC's emphasis on a life-course perspective. My first project at Purdue was about infants and young children and some people questioned why I am interested in our youngest children as well as gerontology. I could tell them gerontology studies "the aging process from gestation to death" and there is growing literature on the life-long health consequences of early childhood nutrition. I've also enjoyed participating in diverse community programs in CALC as my work is largely in front of computers. I could meet older adults living in the community through Senior Grocery Program that provides foods to those in need as well as older adults living in the senior living facilities through Tech Team that helps with small technical issues. I hope to continue working on research assessing what people eat, investigating the associations between diet and aging experience, and translating the findings to a broader population, especially vulnerable subpopulations.

Awards:

• Poster Presentation Winner, Interdisciplinary Nutrition Program, Purdue University, 2019
• Travel Award, Third short course on strengthening causal inference in behavioral obesity research, The University of Alabama at Birmingham, 2017
• Ross Fellowship, Purdue University, 2016

Publications:

• Jun S, Zeh MJ, Eicher-Miller HA, Bailey RL. Children's Dietary Quality and Micronutrient Adequacy by Food Security in the Household and among Household Children. Nutrients 2019; 11(5), 965. doi: 10.3390/nu11050965.
• Jun S, Cowan AE, Tooze JA, Gahche JJ, Dwyer JT, Eicher-Miller HA, Bhadra A, Guenther PM, Potischman N, Dodd KW, Bailey RL. Dietary supplement use among U.S. children by family income, food security level, and nutrition assistance program participation status in 2011–2014. Nutrients 2018; 10(9), 1212. doi: 10.3390/nu10091212.
• Jun S, Catellier D, Eldridge AL, Dwyer JT, Eicher-Miller HA, Bailey RL. Usual nutrient intakes from the diets of U.S. children by WIC participation and income: findings from the Feeding Infants and Toddlers Study (FITS) 2016. The Journal of Nutrition 2018; 148 (9S) 1567S-1574S. doi:10.1093/jn/nxy059.
• Jun S, Thuppal SV, Maulding MK, Eicher-Miller HA, Savaiano DA, Bailey RL. Poor Dietary Guidelines compliance among low-income women eligible for Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program-Education (SNAP-Ed). Nutrients 2018; 10, 327. doi:10.3390/nu10030327.

Presentations:

• Jun S, Cowan AE, Bhadra A, Dodd KW, Dwyer JT, Eicher-Miller HA, Gahche JJ, Guenther PM, Potischman N, Tooze JA, Bailey RL. Nutritional status of older adults who are overweight or obese compared to those with a healthy weight, NHANES 2011-2014. Nutrition 2019, Baltimore, U.S. June 8-11, 2019.
• Jun S, Cowan AE, Bhadra A, Dodd KW, Dwyer JT, Eicher-Miller HA, Gahche JJ, Guenther PM, Potischman N, Tooze JA, Bailey RL. Nutritional status of older adults who are overweight or obese compared to those with a healthy weight. OIGP Spring Reception, May 1, 2019.
• Jun S, Cowan AE, Tooze JA, Eicher-Miller HA, Bhadra A, Guenther PM, Gahche JJ, Potischman N, Dwyer JT, Bailey RL. Dietary supplement use is higher among US children in higher income households compared to children in lower income households. Nutrition 2018, Boston, U.S. June 9-12, 2018.
• Jun S, Eldridge AL, Bailey RL. Characterizing the dietary practices and nutritional exposures of US children (birth-48 months): Data from the Feeding Infants and Toddlers Study (FITS), 2016. OIGP Spring Reception, May 2, 2018.

Leadership:

• Liaison to the Interdisciplinary Graduate Program Students, Center on Aging and the Life Course, Purdue University, Fall 2017-Spring 2019.
• Social committee member, Nutrition Graduate Student Organization, Summer 2018-Spring 2019.