Maira Bes-Rastrollo, professor at department of Preventive Medicine and Public Health of the University of Navarra, received in Madrid the award to the research Jesús Serra Foundation in the clinical category. She was joined by Dr. Manuel Irimia, Full Professor of research ICREA and head of group at the Center for Genomic Regulation (CRG) for his research on the mechanisms that regulate insulin secretion and that could prevent the development of diabetes.

Considered as one of the most important Spanish researchers in health sciences in the area of Nutrition and Dietetics and one of the best Spanish scientists according to the ranking carried out by the CSIC, Maira Bes-Rastrollo has focused her research in nutritional epidemiology on understanding how different dietary patterns influence chronic diseases and their mortality. On this occasion, the professor of the School of Medicine and researcher attached to CIBERobn has been recognized for her research on the identification of healthier vegan per diem expenses patterns. 

The prizes, worth 35,000 euros in each category, are intended to finance the winners' projects. In her case, the researcher and her team will develop and validate in the context of a European project , for the first time worldwide, a questionnaire to assess in a standardized way the nutritional quality of vegans. This will allow the detection of dietary and health risks in a clinical context and will help health professionals to improve dietary recommendations to vegans.

"This award will co-finance the project VEGANScreener, a project that is part of a line of research on food, health and sustainability," Bes-Rastrollo detailed. "The goal of development Sustainable SDG3, on health and wellness, emphasizes the need to promote a per diem expenses mainly of plant origin, which in addition to being healthy, will in turn be more sustainable from an environmental point of view. However, this subject of diets may have nutritional deficiencies, while their nutritional quality varies according to food choices. Thanks to this award we will be able to do a full validation with the group control of omnivorous people that will help us identify the healthiest vegan per diem expenses patterns."

How to follow a healthy vegan per diem expenses ?

The awards ceremony submission emphasized the need for an interdisciplinary research on the effects of per diem expenses on health, as well as on the role of nutrient metabolism in the development of diseases such as cancer, cardiovascular diseases or obesity.

In addition, the fifth edition of these awards coincided with the 25th anniversary of the Jesús Serra Foundation. "The research has been a pillar of the Foundation's activity since its beginnings," said the Foundation's president, Federico Halpern. "Two of our raisons d'être converge in the awards: supporting young talent and promoting programs that improve the well-being of our society."

goal For this reason, prior to the ceremony, the workshop "How to follow a healthy vegan per diem expenses " was organized with the aim of creating new spaces for meeting between research and its beneficiaries, whether they are clinicians, patient associations or people interested in learning about healthy diets. The event, moderated by Beatriz Robles, dietician-nutritionist, professor of the University Isabel I and scientific disseminator, was attended by Maira Bes-Rastrollo as guest researcher and also by Andrea Calderón as nutritionist, member of the board board of the Spanish Society of Dietetics and Food Sciences (SEDCA), and co-author of a guide on vegan diets for clinicians.