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Frank B. Hu, M.D., Ph.D.

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Biography
Tongji Medical College, Huazhong University of Science & Technology, Wuhan, ChinaMD1988
University of Illinois at Chicago School of Public Health, Chicago, IllinoisMPH1993
University of Illinois at Chicago School of Public Health, Chicago, IllinoisPhD1996
1997
Research Paper Listed as American Heart Association's Top Ten Research Advances for 1997
1998
Charles A. King Trust Research Fellowship
1998
Elizabeth Barrett-Connor research Award Finalist in Epidemiology for Young Investigators, AHA
2001
Research Paper Listed as American Heart Association's Top Ten Research Advances for 2001
2002
Established Investigator Award, AHA
2010
Kelly West Award in Outstanding Achievement in Diabetes Epidemiology, American Diabetes Association
2015
Elected member, National Academy of Medicine
2018
Ancel Keys Memorial Lecturer American Heart Association Scientific Sessions
2020
Boyd Orr Trust Fund Lecturer, The Nutrition Society, UK-Ireland
2022
Scientific Award Keynote Speaker, 2022 Annual Scientific Program

Overview
Dr. Frank Hu is Chair of Department of Nutrition, Fredrick J. Stare Professor of Nutrition and Epidemiology at Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health and Professor of Medicine, Harvard Medical School and Brigham and Women’s Hospital. Dr. Hu received his MD from Tongji Medical College in China and MPH and PhD in Epidemiology from University of Illinois at Chicago. He completed a postdoctoral fellowship in Nutritional Epidemiology at Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health. Dr. Hu’s major research interests include epidemiology and prevention of cardiometabolic diseases through diet and lifestyle; gene-environment interactions; nutritional metabolomics; and nutrition transitions in low- and middle-income countries. Currently, he is Director of Boston Nutrition and Obesity Research Center Epidemiology and Genetics Core and Director of Dietary Biomarker Development Center at Harvard University. He has published a textbook on Obesity Epidemiology (Oxford University Press) and >1400 peer-reviewed papers with an H-index of 290. He served on the Institute of Medicine (IOM) Committee on Preventing the Global Epidemic of Cardiovascular Disease, the Obesity Guideline Expert Panel, American Heart Association Nutrition Committee, and the 2015 Dietary Guidelines Advisory Committee, USDA/HHS. He has served on the editorial boards of Lancet Diabetes & Endocrinology, Diabetes Care, and Clinical Chemistry. Dr. Hu was elected to the National Academy of Medicine in 2015.

Dr. Frank Hu’s research has focused on diet/lifestyle, metabolic, and genetic determinants of obesity, type 2 diabetes, and cardiovascular disease (CVD). His major research interests include epidemiology and prevention of cardiometabolic diseases through diet and lifestyle; gene-environment interactions and risk of obesity and type 2 diabetes; nutritional metabolomics in type 2 diabetes and cardiovascular disease; and obesity, metabolic phenotypes, and cardiovascular disease in low and middle-income countries. Dr. Hu’s group has conducted detailed analyses of many dietary and lifestyle factors and risk of diabetes and CVD, including sugar-sweetened beverages, coffee, red meat, saturated and polyunsaturated fatty acids, iron, and dietary patterns in large prospective cohort studies including the Nurses’ Health Study and Health Professionals Follow-up Study. These findings have contributed to current public health recommendations and policies for the prevention of chronic diseases. His group has also identified novel biomarkers and gene-environment interactions in relation to risk of obesity and diabetes by integrating cutting-edge omics technologies into epidemiological studies. In addition, Dr. Hu has conducted extensive research on nutrition transition, metabolic phenotypes, and cardiovascular disease in low and middle-income countries.

Research
The research activities and funding listed below are automatically derived from NIH ExPORTER and other sources, which might result in incorrect or missing items. Faculty can login to make corrections and additions.
  1. UG3HL170034 (FANG, CAROLYN Y.) Aug 15, 2023 - Jul 31, 2025
    NIH
    Asian American Community Cohort and Equity Study (ACCESS)
    Role: Co-Principal Investigator
  2. U2CDK129670 (HU, FRANK B) Aug 16, 2021 - Jun 30, 2026
    NIH
    Dietary Biomarkers Development Center at Harvard University
    Role: Principal Investigator
  3. R01DK127601 (HU, FRANK B) Mar 15, 2021 - Jan 31, 2025
    NIH
    Lifestyle Interventions, metabolites, microbiome, and diabetes risk
    Role: Principal Investigator
  4. R01DK125803 (TOBIAS, DEIRDRE KAY) Sep 1, 2020 - May 31, 2025
    NIH
    Health effects of substituting sugar-sweetened beverages with non-caloric beverages in adults with overweight and obesity
    Role: Co-Investigator
  5. R01AI148338 (LIANG, LIMING) Aug 13, 2020 - Jul 31, 2024
    NIH
    Infant blood epigenome and risks of IgE sensitization, obesity, and asthma: MARC-35/43 cohorts
    Role: Co-Investigator

Bibliographic
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Funded by the NIH National Center for Advancing Translational Sciences through its Clinical and Translational Science Awards Program, grant number UL1TR002541.