Sperm meets egg. Now what? Epigeneticist Andrew Prentice searches for the answer to this question every day. In this talk he takes the emerging science of epigenetics and simplifies this seemingly complex subject by explaining the fundamental role that a mother’s diet at conception can have on her child’s long term health outcomes and how this knowledge could lead to ground-breaking interventions to improve the most vulnerable’s health. Find out if you actually are what your mother ate.

Andrew Prentice founded the MRC International Nutrition Group at LSHTM in 1999. Born in Uganda, he studied in East Africa and the UK obtaining a BSc in Biochemistry followed by a PhD in Nutrition from Darwin College, Cambridge. He worked in the MRC Dunn Nutrition Unit’s rural field station in Keneba, The Gambia from 1978-83. In 1983 he returned to the MRC Dunn Clinical Nutrition Centre in Cambridge to become Head of Human Energy Metabolism where he specialised in studying the regulation of energy balance with a particular focus on obesity. In 1998 he became scientific director of the MRC Keneba fieldstation and of the Nutrition Programme for MRC The Gambia Unit, a role he still maintains.

This talk was given at a TEDx event using the TED conference format but independently organized by a local community. Learn more at http://ted.com/tedx