Rachel Novotny PhD, MS

The Nutritional Assessment of Populations program (NAP). My research interests focus on diet, physical activity and body size factors, their influence on the process of growth and maturation, and implications for health and disease. My work focuses on periods of rapid growth, including pregnancy, infancy, and adolescence. Research areas include the role of breast-feeding in maturation and growth, and the importantce of variability of body size in different population groups for risk of disease.
Current research focuses on adolescent growth, maturation and bone development and the need for adequate weight and fat for bone growth to precent osteoporosis in opposition to the concern of early maturation that increases risk of reproductive cancers.