It is a question University of Otago PhD candidate and medical student Cameron Young aims to answer after recently receiving a Fulbright New Zealand Graduate Award to study overseas.
Mr Young plans to research chronic disease progression, focusing on how diet during pregnancy causes epigenetic changes in offspring at the Wisconsin Institute of Discovery, and nutritional public health interventions at the Center for Indigenous Health, at Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, in Arizona and New Mexico.
His PhD is focused on diet during pregnancy and its association with chronic disease risk and progression, in both the mother and child.
He was "very humbled and proud" to have received the award, and was looking forward to the life-changing opportunity to learn from talented scholars and others in the United States.
He will travel to the University of Wisconsin-Madison in October, spending six months there, before spending another six months at Johns Hopkins, completing research for his PhD.
He was among five University of Otago staff and alumni to receive Fulbright New Zealand Graduate and Scholar Awards this year.
University of Otago (Wellington) public health department Prof Michael Baker received a Fulbright NZ Scholar Award and will research the prevention and control of emerging infectious diseases at the Harvard University Center for Communicable Disease Dynamics in Boston, Massachusetts.
University of Otago (Christchurch) nursing and Māori indigenous health innovations graduate Kelly Tikao received a Fulbright Ngā Pae o te Māramatanga Graduate Award and will research how native Hawaiian practitioners and traditional healers rejuvenate customary native Hawaiian maternity practices in the hospital and community environments.
University of Otago (Dunedin) geography, indigenous development and Māori studies graduate Leteisha Te Awhe-Downey also received a Fulbright Ngā Pae o te Māramatanga Graduate Award and will research indigenous experiences of diaspora at the University of Hawai’i (Mānoa), and the University of California (Berkeley).
And University of Otago (Dunedin) health sciences graduate Laura Gemmell-Sinnott received a Fulbright NZ Graduate Award and will research health policy design in sexual and reproductive health, with a focus on indigenous health equity at Columbia University, New York City, as part of her PhD at the University of Otago.
Otago acting deputy vice-chancellor (research and enterprise) Martin Gagnon said the Fulbright programme was one of the largest and most prestigious educational exchanges in the world.
