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Sari Voutilainen
Sari graduated from the Department of Clinical Nutrition at the
University of Kuopio and soon after she started her research career
at the Research Institute of Public Health. Sari spends her leisure
time enjoying the fresh air and the rich nature beginning straight
from her own backyard. The fall is especially her season and not
a day goes without a full basket of the most delicious mushrooms.
She is a well-known mushroom enthusiast who recognizes most of
the species and has an endless list of different recipes; mainly
for non-toxic ones…
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Sari has been responsible for the nutritional
studies at the Research Institute of Public Health since 1996. The
topic of her doctoral studies was in the beginning the serum fatty
acids and cardiovascular diseases, which has been the traditional
aim for the novice nutritionists at the institute since then, although
not a single thesis has been yet finished about the topic. Very
soon the aim of her thesis was changed to the folate and homocysteine
and the risk of cardiovascular diseases. Sari did her postdoctoral
work at the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill, USA in 2003-4.
A major theme in her work is the role of gene-nutrient interactions
in chronic diseases. One of the most interesting hobby for Sari is to develope new methods for reliable data collection of nutrient intake. It doesn’t matter whether the study subjects are drug users, pregnant women or middle-aged men, only a large sample size is important. Sari is also a Adjunct Professor of Public Health at the University of Kuopio, School of Public Health and Clinical Nutrition.
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| Sari's CV |
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Tarja Nurmi
Tarja joined us in 2000 from Folkhalsan Research Center, Division
of Clinical Chemistry, University of Helsinki. The surest way
to get her interested are the magic words: "This has never
been measured before..." Higher the number of the samples,
the greater the enthusiasm will be. She may have been a sister
of a shaman or a healer of the village in her previous life. If
you see her discussing with the aliens from the outer space, do
not hesitate to join in to have fun. She is easy to recognize
of her loud and cheerful laughter and voice, which cannot be muffled.
Quite soon after she started at the Institute, she was nominated
to be the most boisterous researcher, replacing the chief of the
nutritional group, but only in the amount and intensity of the
voice...
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Seriously speaking, she develops analytical methods for biological
samples, and applies them in our studies. She serves our group,
when ever needed a method for a nutrition study, but she also
collaborates actively with other research groups. If you are interested
in diet derived compounds and their metabolism in human subjects,
and wish to have your samples analysed, please feel free to contact
Tarja. Years 2007-09 Tarja will work as a Research Fellow of the Academy of Finland.
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| Tarja's CV |
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Few years ago the Christmas Party time of our Institute was getting
closer and for that we needed new researchers, who have the "honour"
to be responsible about the program at the party. The nutrition researchers
had the responsibility for the enlistment that time. Little did we know
what we would get, when Jyrki and Jaakko (Jaska) joined the group. The
Christmas Parties haven't been the same ever since…
Jyrki and Jaska started their studies of clinical nutrition in Kuopio
in the same course in 1995 and from then on they have either studied
or now worked at the same place.
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Jyrki Virtanen
Jyrki is another one of our Institute's extraterrestrial scientists.
This is especially well seen in one Friday night in December,
when he can be seen in his original color (blue
or green). The time he doesn't spend being painted blue, he can
be seen in the gym usually in front of a mirror, but sometimes
giving personal trainers nutrition education. Sometimes he gets
an inspiration and pulls out his colored pencils to draw something,
usually a bird (web site: From
the Tip of My Pencil). In summer 2003, after turning 30, he
decided to (try to) start acting like an adult. The result of
this was a membership in a wine club and his latest passion: golf…
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When Jyrki started at the Institute, he inherited
his topic, flavonoids, from Meri Vanharanta, whose interest had
already been turned to enterolactone. However, he soon became more
interested in homocysteine, and since then he has continued to study
the mystical world of homocysteine. A part of his interest has also
been given to the health effects of fish and fish oils and factors
that can modify those effects, like methylmercury in fish. Jyrki
will continue the research on this topic at the Harvard School of
Public Health as a post doc in Fall 2005.
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| Jyrki's CV |
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Jaakko Mursu
The easiest way to contact Jaakko is to head at local woods.
There he spends most of his leisure time stumbling either with
his mountain bike or with his dog. He is fanatic mountain biker
and praises cycling as excellent way of improving physical condition,
but some argue that it is easiest way to get bruises, broken bones
and to get lost. He is a proud owner of a virile, but stubborn
Jack Russell terrier who is named Keijo after famous Finnish F1-formula
driver. It is well known that the dog resembles its owner and
as the dog has suffered several injuries including broken tail
and missing couple of teeth you cannot disagree.
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Jaakko has also raised the standards of supplementation studies
to a new level by introducing triple blinded studies where even
the researchers are unaware what really has been supplemented
and how much. Jaakko is specialized on conducting different supplementation
studies concentrating mainly on studying the effects of flavonoids
and different phenolic compounds on lipid peroxidation and antioxidant
systems in humans.
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| Jaakko's CV |
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Anu Ruusunen
Anu is a MSc and clinical nutritionist who has been involved in the Institute's nutrition studies already for years, working with dietary records. The thesis of her PhD work is "nutrition, genes, their interactions and effect on depression". During the couple of past years Anu has concentrated on two children (-04 and -06) but is now working again as a full-time researcher. With Anu and Tommi, our nutrition studies have expanded to deal with the effect of nutrition on the prevention of psychiatric problems, such as depression. Folate, omega-3-fatty acids, omega 6/omega 3 -ratio, coffee, tea and caffeine and dietary patterns in general are all topics of Anu's interest. The idea of prevent mental problems as well as the idea of helping people to recover from those illnesses are close to her heart. At free-time Anu enjoys baking, jogging, spinning and struggling in BodyCombat.
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| Anu's CV |
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