Professor John Edward Blundell BSc and PhD

JB has a BSc in Psychology and a PhD in Neuroscience from the University of London (Institute of Neurology). He holds the Chair of PsychoBiology in the Faculty of Medicine and Health at the University of Leeds.

JB’s initial research concerned the relationship among brain mechanisms, foods and appetite control, and led to the development of the Satiety Cascade. Currently, the research is focussed upon the study of human appetite within an energy balance framework and has demonstrated that Energy Expenditure is a strong determinant of the Drive to Eat. Other research has included genetic studies on anorexia nervosa, the impact of physical activity on appetite, and mechanisms of action of anti-obesity drugs. The Leeds research team has developed several instruments for the evaluation of human appetite in the laboratory and the real world.

JB was a member of the UK government DSI Foresight Expert Group that developed the concept of the Obesities Systems Map as the basis for the Change for Life Programme; he was also a member of the DoH Expert Group on Social Marketing approach to childhood obesity. JB has been an expert consultant for ILSI and EFSA and has served on a number of Scientific Obesity Advisory Boards.

JB has received numerous prizes including the Johananoff International Fellowship, the Gino Bergami Prize, Sir David Cuthbertson Prize and the British Nutrition Foundation Prize. He has been visiting professor at the University of Ghent and Distinguished International Visiting Scholar at the University of Rhode Island. JB has been a long-standing scientific governor of the BNF, was a founding member of the European Association for the Study of Obesity, and in 2019 he received a Lifetime Achievement Award from UK ASO. In 2022 JB received the Wertheimer Award from the World Obesity Federation.