Good nutrition is a essential for good health. Poor nutrition can lead to reduced immunity, increased susceptibility to disease, impaired physical and mental development, and reduced productivity.

Despite these risks, many people consume too many foods high in calories, fats, free sugars or salt, and many do not eat enough fruit, vegetables and dietary fibre. Often this is down to a lack of time, knowledge or acceptable tasting alternatives to unhealthy foods. However, a new wave of start-ups have taken up the challenge of addressing these issues by using the latest advances in artificial intelligence.

We decide to pick out some of the best examples. You can see their profiles below. You can also search for 100s of other innovators in nutrition and artificial intelligence in our database.

SmartPlate / USA / Machine vision and machine learning for food identification

designer-right[1]SmartPlate is developing a “smart plate” that tracks what you eat. It is designed to visually determine the food placed on it, weigh the portions, and then report back calorie and nutritional data via a smartphone app. The SmartPlate also uses advanced machine learning to better identify foods as more and more people use the platform.

The company says its advanced optical recognition shows 99 percent accuracy with many foods, and can determine the difference for example between white bread and wheat bread, and pasta with marinara sauce and pasta Alfredo.

UM.AI / UK / AI-base smart food advisor

5perpective-ww[1]UM.AI is a smart food advisor that tracks and analyses what you eat in order to provide personalized food recommendations. UM.AI says it exploits cutting edge technology in semantic and machine learning to structure more than 2 billion food data points in a logical and easy to use manner. Just tell um.ai what you had, the same way you would tell your friends… and the company’s AI will take care of the rest.

Nuritas / Ireland / AI + DNA analysis to discover bioactive peptides

cyril1-01[1]Nuritas aims to rapidly and efficiently provide access to the most-health benefiting components within foods, called bioactive peptides. Nuritas combines artificial intelligence and DNA analysis to discovers novel and active peptide ingredients with scientifically proven health benefits, which include: anti-inflammatory activity, antimicrobial activity, muscle recovery enhancement, skin anti-aging solutions, and the potential management of blood sugar levels for type 2 diabetics.

The bioactive peptides can be used in a range of products including functional and medical foods, pharmaceuticals, dietary supplements, as well as cosmetics and personal care.

The Not Company / Chile / AI Food Scientist to create animal product substitutes

static1.squarespace.comThe Not Company is building ‘Giuseppe’ an artificial intelligence model programmed to become the smartest food scientist on earth. Giuseppe takes meat-based recipes and re-creates plant-based versions that emulate the taste, flavour, and texture of the original. By allowing cunsumers to re-create more sustainable versions of meat-based products the company is aiming to eliminate the massive amounts of land and other resources required to support traditional animal farming.

Suggestic / USA / Machine learning-based lifestyle recommendations for Type 2 Diabetes reversal

Imagen_SocialMedia[1]Suggestic helps users move towards the goal of Type 2 Diabetes reversal by using machine learning technology that creates an individualized nutrition and lifestyle program based on factors such as DNA, blood, saliva and gut microbiome, diet and activity logs. The company’s technology originates from deep learning algorithms originally created for fraud prevention.

Nutrino / Israel / Personalized nutrition driven by IBM Watson

Screenshot_20160210-113748[1]Nutrino and IBM Watson have developed the Nutrino App to provide expectant mothers with real-time science-based, personalized and contextual nutrition advice. The Nutrino App combines Nutrino’s nutrition insights platform with Watson’s natural language capability and deep question and answer capability to offer personalized meal recommendations and 24/7 nutritional support.