ABSTRACT
During the past few years, the concepts of food and nutrition have evolved from being considered only within the context of providing energy and nutrients to human populations, to the current understanding of nutritional research in the twenty-rst century, which has expanded to include as a main scientic objective, the understanding of the role of the diet in the metabolic regulation, and improvement of human health (Schnackenberg et al. 2010). Thus, modern nutritional research focuses on health promotion, disease prevention, protection against toxicity and stress, and on performance improvement.
