Marly A. Cardoso holds a PhD in Food Science and Experimental Nutrition from the School of Pharmaceutical Sciences and a Qualified University Lecturer in Public Health at the University of Sao Paulo, Brazil, where she is a Full Professor of Nutritional Epidemiology and leader of the MINA-Brazil research group. She served as the Director of the country?s first graduate program in Public Health Nutrition. She was a Lemann Visiting Scholar of the David Rockefeller Center for Latin American Studies at Harvard University, Fulbright Food Studies Chair of the University of California Davis, USA, and a research member of the Center for Epidemiological Studies in Health and Nutrition of the University of Sao Paulo  Expertise: Experience in dietary assessment methods, dietary data analysis, design, development and analysis of nutritional surveys. Dr. Cardoso was the Principal Investigation for research projects funded by FAPESP and CNPq on diet and Nutrition related Chronic Diseases. She is also member of the Japanese-Brazilians Diabetes Study Group that conducted the Fapesp funded project “Diabetes type 2 and associated diseases among the Japanese-Brazilians living in Bauru.”

Considering the nutritional transition in Brazil, she has been working also on nutritional surveys in the Amazon region. In child health, she has been describing health and nutritional conditions in Amazonian counties with socioeconomic indicators that are substantially lower than the national average. The fieldwork has been done with the participation of community health agents, nursing students from Federal University of Acre, and university level health professionals with training and local supervision by her research team. Her research team has been working in the assessment of environmental conditions and child health status (including assessment of anthropometric indices, biochemical indicators and morbidities - diarrhea, respiratory diseases and other infections), and providing basic health information and training for health workers, mothers and children, including cooking workshops to increase the consumption of local fruits and vegetables.