ICREA Academy distinction to Prof. Jordi Salas Salvadó
The Catalan Institution for Research and Advanced Studies, has awarded Prof Jordi Salas Salvadó, deputy director of the Health Research Institute Pere Virgili (IISPV), the ICREA Academy 2019 award.
The ICREA Academia Program aims to encourage and reward excellence in research and teaching among professionals with permanent positions at Catalan public universities. The program was developed to reduce teaching commitments of professionals whose research activity is undergoing an expansion phase. In this way, they can dedicate extra effort to their research, facilitating the retention of talent within the Catalan university system.
Prof Jordi Salas Salvadó is the clinical director of Nutrition of the Internal Medicine Service of the Sant Joan University Hospital in Reus, professor of Nutrition and Bromatology at the Rovira i Virgili University (URV) and the principal investigator of the national CIBERobn network. He is also a member of the Catalan Public Health Agency and director of the Catalan Nutrition Center of the Institute of Catalan Studies (CCNIEC, in Catalan), whose aim is to contribute to society by advancing nutrition research and improving the quality of information and training in this area.
Prof. Salas is on the list of the most influential scientists worldwide for the impact of his research according to the list Highly Cited Researchers 2019. His articles have been cited more than 42,000 times and has an h index of 88, i.e. 88 of his articles have been cited 88 times or more.
His research focuses on evaluating the effect of the Mediterranean diet on obesity, diabetes, metabolic syndrome and cardiovascular disease. As part of his research he was one of the researchers behind the launch of the Predimed study, the largest clinical trial to date on nutrition. The results of this trial demonstrated for the first time, that the Mediterranean diet supplemented with virgin olive oil and nuts is able to reduce the incidence of cardiovascular problems. Currently he is the coordinator of the Predimed Plus study involving nearly 200 researchers from 31 research groups across the country. At IISPV, Prof Salas participates in several European projects such as the Eat2BeNice Consortium that brings together professionals and public to learn how lifestyle, nutrition, genetics, and gut microbes contribute to mental health.
