Scientists want more research on supplements mitigating environmental nutrient gaps

Researchers at the University of California (UC) Irvine, US, call for more research to better understand how dietary supplements can contribute to nutrition security, as this is under threat from environmental challenges. 

They note that environmental challenges are threatening nutrition and related health outcomes. These include rising carbon dioxide concentrations, changes in climate patterns, or heightened frequency or severity of extreme weather events. 

In their paper, the team highlights three critical research gaps at the intersection of supplements and these threats: assessing nutrient deficiencies caused by environmental threats, enhancing biological resilience to environmental stressors, and altering environmental impacts by changing dietary patterns and industry practices.

“By addressing these gaps, we can better understand how dietary supplements might contribute to nutrition security and health in the US amid changing environmental conditions. This knowledge will inform public health policies and interventions, while considering the complex interplay between dietary supplements, nutrition, and environmental factors,” note the authors.

“Dietary supplements are not a substitute for a healthy diet or for fixing the underlying problems in our food system,” says senior author Jun Wu, professor of environmental and occupational health at UC Irvine. “But as environmental challenges intensify, it’s important to understand whether they can play a limited, evidence-based role alongside broader solutions.”

Underrepresented research

The perspective, published in Advances in Nutrition, argues that rigorous research on environmental challenges is “severely underrepresented” in the nutrition, environmental, and public health literature.

Earlier research cautioned that climate change is threatening the nutritional quality of crops like rice and leafy greens, which the authors said could heighten risks of malnutrition and chronic disease.

The new paper highlights that a “timely, urgent, and thorough” response from the research community is key to determining if and how supplements can be integrated into environmental adaptation and mitigation strategies.

The paper calls on researchers and industry to determine how to integrate supplements into environmental adaptation and mitigation strategies.“Environmental change is not only an ecological issue. It’s a nutrition and public health issue,” says first author Margaret Nagai-Singer, a research fellow in UC Irvine’s Wen Public Health.

“When the food system becomes less stable or less nutritious, people feel it in very real ways — in their health, their medical costs, and their daily lives.”

Collaborative efforts

The authors propose an interdisciplinary and collaborative research agenda to address the complex intersection of supplements, nutrition security, resilience, and environmental challenges.

The authors call on the supplement industry to ensure product quality, share proprietary data where appropriate, and implement sustainable sourcing practices. They note that researchers, funders, and regulators should collaborate to design rigorous studies, while public health experts can identify priority populations and translate findings into practice.

They see a role for researchers in many disciplines, including nutrition and food science, agriculture, environmental science, epidemiology, toxicology, public health, social science, and policy research.

For example, to fill the research gap on nutrient deficiencies caused by environmental changes, they urge the creation of novel nutrient status measurement techniques that can be used in many communities and deployed in areas affected by environmental stressors.

They suggest merging geocoded, timestamped nutrition survey data with environmental data and using simulation modeling to estimate nutrient gaps driven by the environment. They also recommend conducting studies to monitor nutritional outcomes across different affected populations and to confirm the bioavailability of ingredients in those populations.

To enhance biological resilience, they propose combining AI and omics research to identify bioactives that improve resilience and to characterize interactions among environmental exposure, nutritional status, and health outcomes. The authors also suggest integrating indigenous knowledge of botanicals into clinical trials.

Supplements can help people meet recommended nutrient intakes, as long as they ensure ingredient quality, bioavailability, and safety.The authors note that community-based research can help identify the potential harmful impacts on the environment of sourcing supplement ingredients. Meanwhile, they urge researchers to explore environmental policy and regulatory approaches to limit these impacts.

In addition, the team urges ensuring accessibility and affordability of strategies for populations most impacted by environmental stressors.

“The financial cost of integrating dietary supplements into environmental adaptation strategies, if found to be safe and effective, should not increase costs for those who are in greatest need of access to adaptation strategies,” details the paper.

Supplement limitations

Although supplements can help people meet recommended nutrient intakes, the authors caution that quality, bioavailability, safety, and chemical characterization of ingredients must be addressed to determine their health impact.

Moreover, they highlight several limitations in the research on supplements. For example, assessing the impact of a single nutrient may not translate into real-world outcomes, as these can interact with other foods and ingredients. 

They say comprehensive, multi-year studies are needed to assess the efficacy and safety of supplements, while health effects may differ significantly across population groups.

However, they warn that regulatory frameworks may pose a barrier to rigorous research on supplements, as brands cannot market these products as treating, preventing, or curing a disease.

Additionally, even if one company finds health benefits for an ingredient, the authors note that the quality and composition of supplements containing that ingredient would not be standardized between different brands.

“This poses safety and efficacy concerns for any application of dietary supplements,” caution the authors. “It also poses an opportunity for advocates, policymakers, and regulators to consider alternative regulatory frameworks.”

Finally, the researchers underscore that supplements cannot replace a nutritious diet and should not replace strategies to address issues in the food system, such as food insecurity or environmental consequences of agricultural practices.