About Crystal Karakochuk

 

Associate Professor, Human Nutrition
Canada Research Chair Tier 2 in Micronutrients and Human Health
Michael Smith Foundation for Health Research Scholar
The Faculty of Land and Food Systems
The University of British Columbia

Affiliations:

Investigator, Healthy Starts, BC Children’s Hospital Research Institute
Investigator, Women’s Health Research Institute at BC Women’s Hospital


Contact:

Food Nutrition and Health Building
216-2205 East Mall
Vancouver BC, Canada, V6T 1Z4
Tel: +1-604-822-0421
Email: crystal.karakochuk@ubc.ca


Education:

PhD (Human Nutrition), The University of British Columbia
MSc (Nutritional Sciences), The University of Toronto
Dietetic Internship, Vancouver Hospital and Health Sciences Centre
BSc (Dietetics), The University of British Columbia


Current Research:

Dr. Crystal Karakochuk is an Associate Professor in Human Nutrition in the Department of Food, Nutrition, and Health at UBC, an Investigator at the BC Children’s Hospital Research and Women’s Health Research Institutes, and a Canada Research Chair Tier 2 in Micronutrients and Human Health.

Dr. Karakochuk’s research program focuses on micronutrients and human health. She evaluates programs and policies for anemia prevention and treatment, and the risk-benefit of micronutrient interventions in children and pregnant people. Her research brings together clinicians, researchers, and policy makers to advance and apply innovative knowledge in human nutrition.

Dr. Karakochuk’s research addresses two key objectives:

  • To evaluate the risk-benefit of Canadian and global micronutrient interventions to advance clinical practice and inform safe and effective nutrition policy.
  • To improve diagnostic methods and evaluate novel biomarkers for anemia and iron deficiency for individual- and population-level assessment.

Dr. Karakochuk’s laboratory is based at the Food, Nutrition and Health building. She established the infrastructure required to conduct high-throughput work in a high-precision facility, and created a facility to advance analytical methods in nutritional hematology. Her lab is currently focused on the comprehensive measurement and interpretation of indicators of anemia (hematological and nutritional biomarkers) and genetic polymorphisms associated with hemoglobin in individuals, families, and populations. She employs randomized controlled trials as her core methodology which provide the most rigorous design to provide reliable evidence on the effectiveness of interventions. Ultimately, her research yields to important policies that target health, social, and economic benefits to children and families.


Recent Teaching:

FNH 455: Applied International Nutrition. The aim of this course is to provide a critical examination of nutrition interventions in the global health context. Students are required to actively participate in discussions and to work in teams to apply learned knowledge and complete an international nutrition intervention proposal.

HUNU 531/631: Food Nutrition and Health Graduate Seminar Series


Publications:

For a list of recent publications please click here.