Popkin honored with Obesity Society’s lifetime achievement award

Barry Popkin, PhD, W.R. Kenan Jr. Distinguished Professor of nutrition at UNC Gillings School of Global Public Health, has received the Obesity Society’s 2011 Mickey Stunkard Lifetime Achievement Award. The award is presented to those who have made outstanding contributions to the field of obesity through scholarship, mentorship and education.

 

Popkin also is invited to present the Stunkard Lecture at the Society’s 2011 meeting, held Oct. 1-5 in Orlando, Fla. His talk will be titled “The Nutrition Transition: Current U.S. and Global Dynamics.”

 

A graduate of Cornell University, Popkin has been on the UNC nutrition faculty for more than 25 years. He led the establishment of the Division of Nutrition Epidemiology at UNC and was head of that division for more than10 years. He is a fellow at the Carolina Population Center and member of the UNC Lineberger Comprehensive Cancer Center. He initiated – and for eight years, directed – the UNC Interdisciplinary Obesity Center.

 

Popkin is author of The World is Fat: The Fads, Trends, Policies and Products That Are Fattening the Human Race. Published in 2009, the book, according to Publisher’s Weekly, argues that obesity is a “confluence of factors rooted in a fundamental conflict between human biology and modern society, where more calories are consumed than expended, and governments and multinational corporations shape everyday lives.””Barry has made major national and global contributions to our understanding of dynamic shifts in the ways we eat, drink and move,” said June Stevens, PhD, chair of the nutrition department and AICR/WCRF Distinguished Professor of nutrition and epidemiology at the public health school. “He has led long-term research in a number of countries including China, Russia, Brazil, Mexico and the Philippines and has worked to help those countries create policies to address obesity. Barry also continues to be very active in research in the United States and has trained a large number of doctoral students who have gone on to important careers in science. We are fortunate to have such an energetic and productive colleague in our midst.”

“Barry Popkin’s contributions are legion and legendary,” said Barbara K. Rimer, DrPH, dean and Alumni Distinguished Professor at the UNC public health school. “He is part of a truly outstanding department.”

 

The Obesity Society claims more than 2,000 members, including researchers, clinicians and educators, who are dedicated to the study, prevention and treatment of obesity. The award honors obesity researcher Albert J. (Mickey) Stunkard, MD, professor emeritus of psychiatry at the University of Pennsylvania.

 

UNC Gillings School of Global Public Health contact: Ramona DuBose, director of communications, (919) 966-7467 or ramona_dubose@unc.edu.