GET TO KNOW SDSU RESEARCHER SURABHI BHUTANI

We now know that loss of taste and smell are some of the most identifiable symptoms of infection by the novel coronavirus and that loss of smell is one of the strongest predictors of COVID-19. But early on in this pandemic, these were just stories. It took the research of San Diego State University assistant professor Surabhi Bhutani and other experts like her worldwide to determine it to be true.

Bhutani has studied the senses as part of her extensive research in the field of nutrition. Her long list of highly cited reports includes research on holiday weight gain, fasting, heart disease and various eating habits. She joined the Name Drop San Diego podcast at the start of the new year to talk about holiday weight gain, healthy living and how she helped fight back against COVID-19. Read excerpts here or listen to the full episode in your favorite listening app.

On how she got into her line of work:

So I moved to the U.S. back in 2007. When I moved here, I was settling in and went out to grab some lunch. I went to Chipotle, I ordered a burrito, and as soon as I received my burrito, I looked at the size and I was shocked. I had never

seen such a huge portion size in my life. I looked at it, and I’m like, “I don’t know if I can eat it.” I started eating it and I could only eat onefourth of it. It’s a different story in 2021 — I can eat way more than one-fourth of that burrito. That was quite shocking to me. It was very interesting to see as I went to other restaurants that the portion sizes were very big . ... That really made me think about, what is happening? Why are portion sizes so big? Are people actually eating and finishing that whole meal that they’re getting in restaurants?

Her advice on combating holiday weight gain:

The first thing you should be careful about is not gaining that holiday weight because once you’ve gained it, it’s really difficult to lose it. It’s 50 percent of the weight you’re going to gain during the whole year. ... Be very careful about changing your regular dietary habits to an extreme. Some people tend to, on Thanksgiving and Christmas Eve, fast all day in anticipation of “I’m going to binge on food.” That actually backfires because you end up eating way more food . ... Leftovers are a huge culprit . ... Drinks also provide an excessive amount of calories without giving you any other nutrients.

But this is something you’d want to do during the holidays. Post-holidays, if you’ve gained weight, make sure that you’re not keeping up with the same regimen you got into during the holidays. You need to find activities that help you reduce your stress . ... So keep yourself active. Don’t get into the habit of eating and eating and eating because we’re all so primed with food cues throughout the holidays that we tend to continue doing that. Daily weighing has been shown to be very effective. So if you weigh yourself every day throughout the holidays, you’re going to be less prone to gaining that holiday body weight.

On her research on COVID-19 and smell:

My interest really came through in this particular area when I started looking at the news in March and April when there were a lot of things on Facebook, people complaining about losing sense of smell, on Twitter people talking about it . ... So this community of researchers, scientists and industry individuals and even some media people, they all came together and created a consortium called [Global Consortium of Chemosensory Research] ... We created a global questionnaire, converted into more than 30 languages, and it was deployed all over the world.

Of course the best way to determine if you have a positive COVID-19 infection is by getting your nasal swab done. But on an everyday basis, we found that people can actually test their sense of smell and see if there is a change because with COVID-19 you’re going to see a change overnight.