Career Development Fellow

Nutritional Epidemiology

Left the Unit in 2020

Work and interests

Marinka’s interests include exploring aetiological associations of nutrients and foods with long-term risk of cardiometabolic diseases, as well as using objective measures such as nutritional biomarker and genetics. Current projects include the potential role of dietary fatty acids and their food sources in cardiovascular diseases (CVD), and of plant- and animal-based nutrition in risk of diabetes and CVD. She left the Unit in 2020.

Background and experience

Marinka completed her MSc in Nutrition and Health at Wageningen University (NL), during which she spend 5 months at the University of Oxford to investigate vitamin D intake and status in relation to plant-based diets. She obtained her MPhil in Epidemiology with Distinction at the University of Cambridge, where she also completed her PhD at the Cardiovascular Epidemiology Unit (CEU). During her PhD, Marinka investigated genetic interactions with diet in relation to coronary heart disease risk. She joined the MRC Epidemiology Unit in August 2016. Marinka is a Junior Research Fellow of the Governing Body of Wolfson College.

Publications

• MRC Epidemiology Unit publications on the Publications Database

Selected Publications

• Chowdhury R, Steur M, Patel P, Franco OH. Chapter 10: Individual Fatty Acids in Cardiometabolic Disease. Page 207-318.
  In: Handbook of Lipids in Human Health: Fatty Acids. ISBN 9781630670368. Edited by Ronald Ross Watson and Fabien De Meester.
• Pennant M, Steur M, Moore C, Butterworth A, Johnson L. Comparative validity of vitamin C and carotenoids as indicators of fruit and vegetable intake: a systematic review and meta-analysis of randomised controlled trials. Br J Nutr. 2015 Nov 14;114(9):1331-40.
• Steur M. Very Low-Energy Diets-Opportunity for Greater Weight Loss, but Risk of Bone Loss. JAMA Netw Open. 2019 Oct 2;2(10):e1913752.
• Crowe FL*, Steur M*, Key TJ, et al. Plasma concentrations of 25-hydroxyvitamin D in meat eaters, fish eaters, vegetarians and vegans: results from the EPIC-Oxford study. Public Health Nutr. 2011 Feb;14(2):340-6.
  *joint first authors
• Steur M, Smit HA, Wijga A, et al. Predicting the risk of newborn children to become overweight later in childhood. The PIAMA birth cohort study. Int J Pediatr Obes. 2011 Jun;6(2-2):e170-8.