Molecular Nutritionist Offers Inaugural Lecture

On her journey to becoming a university professor and researcher, Ilka Nemere, who joined the faculty of USU's Nutrition and Food Sciences Department in 1995, has often heard, "It can’t be done," “No such thing,” “Impossible.”

 

“I haven’t been playing in the same sandbox as everyone else,” Nemere told family, friends and colleagues who joined her Nov. 2 at the President’s Home for the third talk in the university’s 2005-06 Inaugural Professor Lecture Series. The series highlights the accomplishments of university faculty who have been promoted to full professor in the past year.

 

Yet Nemere seems undaunted by skeptics and doesn’t mind “annoying” colleagues with her nonconformist hypotheses. Instead she forges ahead with her research into non-nuclear receptors-mediated regulation of mineral transport by vitamin D metabolites and the vesicular transport of calcium and phosphate in the intestine.

 

Her research with poultry - “chicken poopology,” as she fondly calls it – could provide a solution to reducing the amount of phosphate transferred from the birds’ manure into waterways. Though beneficial for agriculture, the manure causes significant water pollution around large poultry operations.

 

Her research with human nutrition could unlock some of the mysteries of osteoporosis, a growing health concern for the world’s increasingly elderly population.

 

Nemere’s curiosity drives her efforts. “I realize, 'Gee, I haven’t come up with all the answers yet, so I have to keep looking,’” she said.

 

She thinks there may be a genetic basis for fascination with science. Raised in Los Angeles by a Hungarian-born father and a mother from the former Czechoslovakia, Nemere says her parents encouraged her natural curiosity. “Dad was a civil engineer and my mother was a stay-at-home mom who loved geology,” she said. “Me, I liked bugs.”

 

She adds that her aunt, upon retirement, took up calculus as a hobby.

 

Nemere said that she found high school less than challenging but was intrigued by a unit on biochemistry in a science class. “It was the most logical, neatest thing I’ve ever been shown.”

 

She decided to pursue biology at the University of California, San Diego, where she “loved all the ‘ologies.’” After earning a bachelor’s degree, Nemere started graduate studies at the University of California, Los Angeles. “At first, it was hard to choose a lab,” she said. “Then I noticed some interesting and unconventional research my advisor was doing that involved drawing parallels between two major classes of hormones, steroids and peptides. Pretty soon, I was hooked.”

 

The opportunity to join USU’s faculty and the expansion of her husband’s sales territory into Utah prompted Nemere’s move to Utah State. And Cache Valley complements her equestrian lifestyle. “I’ve been horse-crazy since age two,” she said.

 

Though Nemere yearned for a horse throughout childhood, owning one didn’t become a reality until age 30, at which time Nemere excitedly called her mom and said, “Guess what? I didn’t outgrow it.” 

 

She also appreciates USU’s support of faculty and students’ research endeavors. “Utah State is good about letting you do your own research.”