July 29, 2026 | Erin Bluvas, bluvase@sc.edu
The American Society for Nutrition has launched an Excellence in Nutrition Fellows program, and epidemiology professor Angela Liese has been chosen as one of the inaugural recipients. This mid-career award is designed to recognize active leaders who have made exceptional impacts through their work in nutrition research and/or translation.
An internationally recognized thought leader in nutritional epidemiology, Liese has been advancing the study of dietary patterns and their relationship to chronic disease for three decades. Her interest in the field began at the University of Bonn in Germany and continued with master’s and doctoral degrees at the University of Massachusetts and the University of North Carolina Chapel Hill, respectively. After a few years as a research associate at the University of Münster, Liese accepted a faculty position at the Arnold School in 2000.
“It is wonderful to see Dr. Liese’s long-term, sustained commitment and dedication to scientific rigor on such important public health topics recognized by her inclusion as an Excellence in Nutrition Fellow,” says Anthony Alberg, chair for the Department of Epidemiology and Biostatistics. “This well-deserved honor is a source of pride for all of her colleagues, and we hope her tireless work and dedicated mentorship will inspire many more projects and aspiring researchers to continue this important work.”
Much of Liese’s work has focused on diabetes among youth and adolescents. As the third most common chronic disease they face, diabetes presents a cascade of complex challenges for this vulnerable population. From disease management to mental health impacts, Liese and her colleagues have studied this public health problem from every angle.
For 20 years, she has led the CDC- and NIH-funded SEARCH for Diabetes in Youth Study as co-PI for USC in this multi-center project. In 2018, Liese took this work a step further when she and collaborator, Jason Mendoza, launched the most recent cycle of the SEARCH study – the first scientific investigation to focus on the intersection of food insecurity and diabetes.
“Dr. Liese has truly been a selfless leader, brilliant scientist and skillful people manager for our large research team,” says Mendoza, a professor of public health sciences at the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Center and professor of pediatrics at the University of Washington School of Medicine. “Together, our collaborative team has firmly established food insecurity as an important social determinant of health that necessitates screening and intervention to ameliorate this multi-level issue among youth and young adults with diabetes.”
Over the course of her career, Liese has published more than 240 peer-reviewed papers – many of them co-authored by the dozens of students she has mentored over the years. She has also mentored junior faculty at the Arnold School and collaborated with faculty and staff across USC. Further, Liese’s professional service and national leadership roles have helped inform nutrition policy and programming, such as when she served as an expert panelist for the 2015 Dietary Guidelines for Americans.
Previous recognition for this work includes the 2025 James Clyburn Leadership in Public Health and Health Disparities Research Award, the 2023 Carolina Trustees Professorship, the 2017 Herman Tyroler Distinguished Alumni Award from the UNC Gillings School of Global Public Health, and others. Liese has also been elected as a Fellow of the American College of Epidemiology and the American Heart Association.
“The Excellence in Nutrition Fellowship honors professionals who have distinguished themselves through sustained contributions to the field of nutrition,” says Brie Turner-McGrievy, a professor in the Arnold School’s Department of Health Promotion, Education, and Behavior whose work also focuses on nutrition, chronic disease prevention and vulnerable populations. “Dr. Liese exemplifies these ideals through her pioneering work in nutritional epidemiology and public health nutrition, marked by extraordinary leadership, creativity and impact.”