On behalf of Doctor Pierre Joly, President of the French Foundation for Medical Research, I would like to emphasise the scientific backing of the Foundation for the fifth Danone International Prize for Nutrition, a prize which encourages innovative research in the field of nutrition and draws the public’s attention to the impact of nutrition on health.

The French Medical Research Foundation is a recognised public welfare institution and supports all aspects of medical research. Donations and legacies are attributed - by a Scientific Board elected by the French scientific community – to research areas identified as most promising for the future, one such area is Nutritional research.

Recently, the field of nutrition has been “revolutionised” by technical developments and by the results of epidemiological and clinical studies. In fact, such have been the advances in this field, that nutrition research today now encompasses more elements than ever before Furthermore, Nutrition research is today recognised as being of the utmost importance for many aspects of human health, such as the effects of nutriments on gene expression, protein catabolism and ageing, Nutrition and prevention of pathology, Nutrition and physical exercise and sport, educational aspects for individuals, families and nations, and safety guarantees in industrial products.

For several years, the Foundation for Medical Research has launched scientific programs focused on Nutrition and the relationship between Nutrition, Health and Pathologies. Furthermore, the Foundation has also supported an educational program for the general public entitled “Enjoyable Food, Healthy Food”.

The Foundation for Medical Research and Danone Institute International are proud to work together to encourage advances in the field of Nutrition. One of the primary means of achieving this goal has been the creation, in 1997, of the Danone International Prize for Nutrition. The goal of the prize is to promote and encourage innovative nutrition related research, and thus highlight the importance of nutrition in the overall field of human health.

This year, the Jury has decided to award the Prize to Professor David Barker for having developed an innovative concept called the “Barker Early Origins Hypothesis”.

In 1986 you and your research team were puzzled that coronary heart disease was the most common cause of death among certain men who otherwise had low risk characteristics. This suggested that the aetiology of coronary heart disease needed further exploration. It was this extensive work which led to the development and study of the “Barker Early Origins Hypothesis”. Since then dozens of large-scale epidemiological and experimental studies conducted in Europe, the USA, Asia and elsewhere have supported the new concept that reduced foetal growth followed by poor growth in infancy leads to an increased risk of development of coronary heart disease and related  pathologies. Obviously, the “Barker Hypothesis” has important implications for public health policies, particularly with regard to mothers before conception, pregnancy protection and weight among young children.


Today, Professor Barker, Danone Institute International and the Foundation for Medical Research, has the pleasure and honour of awarding you the Danone International Prize for Nutrition. In your work, you have displayed the same level of excellence as our four previous awardees, Dr. Young, Dr. Hallberg, Dr. Sommer, Dr. Bressani, you have advanced the frontiers of human nutrition and your research has opened new scientific avenues that will help us to better understand and consequently better prevent chronic adult disease.


We offer you, Prof. Barker, our very warmest congratulations