Leif Hambraeus
Professor Leif Hambraeus

From 1972 to 2001 Leif Hambraeus was Professor of Human Nutrition, Faculty of Medicine, Uppsala University, Sweden. Since 2002 he has been affiliated as Senior Professor at the Department of Bioscience and Nutrition, Karolinska Institute, Stockholm, Sweden.

Dr Hambraeus was born in Stockholm, Sweden. After completing his PhD and MD degrees at the Karolinska Institute in Stockholm, he moved to the department of Pediatrics, University Hospital, Uppsala, where he established a metabolic unit for diagnosis and treatment of children with inborn errors of metabolism, which led him into the field of nutrition. He was appointed as the first Professor of Human Nutrition at Uppsala University and established a department of nutrition with special focus on infant nutrition and global nutrition problems. He was also engaged in the introduction of IT technology in global nutrition education programmes for academics in low income countries.

From 1973 until 1974 he was visiting professor at MIT, Boston, USA, which resulted in a very active cooperation for many years with colleagues in the USA, especially the late Professor Vernon Young. He is a member of the Royal Swedish Academy of Agriculture and Forestry and a foreign member of the Finnish Academy of Science and Letters. He is a Fellow of the American Society of Nutrition Science and of the Nutrition Society, London. He has been President of the Federation of European Nutrition Societies, the International Society for Research in Human Milk and Lactation, and the Third European Nutrition Congress. He is a board member of the International Union of Nutrition Sciences (IUNS) and emeritus member of the New York Academy of Sciences.

Area of research: protein and energy turnover in man using stable isotope technique, and indirect and direct suit calorimetry to study energy and protein interaction, and substrate utilization and its relation to physical activity.