Current Members

Post Doctoral Fellows

Mavra Ahmed

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Mavra Ahmed is a Research Associate at the Department of Nutritional Sciences and Joannah and Brian Lawson Centre for Child Nutrition, University of Toronto. Mavra has experience in food and nutrition policy and clinical nutrition with strong expertise… [Read More]

Guanlan Hu

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Guanlan is a Postdoctoral Fellow in the L’Abbé lab. She received the CIHR Healthy Cities Training Award for 2022-2024. Her current research focuses on understanding the economic and nutritional costs of food purchasing behaviours across… [Read More]

Daniel Zaltz

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Daniel joined the L’Abbe Lab in Fall 2023 , where he will be investigating changes in added sugars in the retail food supply, consumption patterns, and projected health impacts of new food labeling policies in… [Read More]

PhD Students

Nadia Flexner

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Nadia is a senior PhD student in the L’Abbé Lab. Her doctoral research focuses on estimating the dietary, health and healthcare costs’ impact of different food policies aiming to improve the Canadian food environment – such as food… [Read More]

Samer Hamamji

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Samer is a PhD Candidate in the L’Abbé Lab. His doctoral research examines the relationship between dietary choices aligned with the recommendations in Canada’s Food Guide 2019 and cardiometabolic risk factors among Canadians using a… [Read More]

Hayun (Sarah) Jeong

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Sarah is a PhD student in the L’Abbe Lab. Her thesis research focuses on facilitating healthy food choices outside the home in Canada and evaluating nutrient profile models for menu labelling. She is also leading… [Read More]

Jennifer Lee

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Jennifer, MPH, RD, is a PhD Candidate in the L’Abbe Lab. She is passionate about transforming our food system and promoting healthy dietary behaviours through public health policy, research, digital technology, and various nutrition communication… [Read More]

Emily Ziraldo

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Emily is a PhD student in the L’Abbé lab. Her thesis research focuses on analyzing the relationship between food policies that aim to improve the diets of Canadians and food prices. Emily is also the… [Read More]

MSc Students

Undergraduate Thesis Students

Julia Do

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Julia is a third-year undergraduate thesis student in the L’Abbe Lab, majoring in Nutritional Sciences and Physiology, with a minor in Psychology. Her research project for NFS394 focuses on evaluating the effect of Front-of-Package Labelling… [Read More]

Ofek Gross

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Ofek Gross is a fourth-year computer science specialist at the University of Toronto who joined the L’Abbé lab this year as a thesis student. Ofek has research background in the intersection of health and technology… [Read More]

Carolina Huang

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Carolina is a fourth-year undergraduate thesis student in the L’Abbe Lab, double majoring in Nutritional Sciences and Health & Disease. Her project focuses on the collection and validation of the Canadian Food Label Information Program (FLIP)… [Read More]

Kyana Lewis

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Kyana is a third-year undergraduate thesis student in the L’ Abbé Lab, majoring in health studies. She first joined the L’Abbe Lab in the summer of 2023 as a research volunteer. Kyana’s third-year research project… [Read More]

Research Assistants

Laura Vergeer

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Laura completed her PhD with Dr. Mary L’Abbé in July 2021 after joining the lab in September 2016 as an undergraduate student. Her doctoral thesis compared the product (re)formulation actions and commitments of the top… [Read More]

Yahan (Hailey) Yang

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Beginning as an undergraduate research summer student in 2018, Hailey went on to obtain her Master’s degree in June 2022 under Dr. L’Abbé. Hailey continues to support the L’Abbe Lab as a Research Analyst. Hailey led a… [Read More]