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1. Food and the evolution of human brain; structure of the nervous system; communication in the body related to metabolism; role of the central nervous system within metabolism.
2. Sensing of food by vision, smell and taste through, olfactory, chemo- and mechanoreceptors; flavour as the sensory impression of food, as determined by the combined senses.
3. Hormonal control of metabolism by the hypothalamus-autonomic central nervous system-liver-stomach-intestine axis; hormones and peptides like insulin, leptin, ghrelin, cholecystokinin, nesfatin, brain-derived neurotrophic factor, nerve growth factor.
4. The brain modulates insulin sensitivity in multiple tissues; metabolic interplay between digestive tract bacteria and their host’s central nervous system; the blood-brain-barrier as a regulator of the digestive tract-brain axis.
5. Circadian rhythms; food intake as peripheral zeitgeber; nutrition as intervention, nutrition for shift work jobs; the Importance of sleep in metabolism.
6. hypothalamus-pituitary-adrenal gland axis; the influence of nutrition on stress, blood cholesterol, low and high blood pressure control, and vice versa.
7. Brain rewards systems and the activation by food.
8. Obesity and metabolic syndrome and the role of the central nervous system.
9. The interrelation of white adipose tissue, leptin and the central nervous system; the interrelation of muscle, exercise and the central nervous system.
10. Depression, mood, behaviour related to nutrition.
11. Nutrition during critical brain development in pregnancy and early years of life.
12. Neurogenesis in general and nutritional effects.
13. Neurodegeneration; dementia: common pathways of inflammation, insulin resistance and glucose levels; the limbic system affected by nutrition, with the hippocampus and amygdala, and its functions like emotion, behaviour, motivation, long term memory.
14. Nutrients and impact on brain function in the elderly.
15. Nutrition after traumatic brain injury