André Briend is a French

pediatric Pediatrics (American English) also spelled paediatrics (British English), is the branch of medicine that involves the medical care of infants, children, adolescents, and young adults. In the United Kingdom, pediatrics covers many of their youth ...

nutritionist A nutritionist is a person who advises others on matters of food and Human nutrition, nutrition and their impacts on health. Some people specialize in particular areas, such as sports nutrition, public health, or animal nutrition, among other disci ...

best known for his 1996 co-formulation of

Plumpy'nut Plumpy'Nut is a peanut-based paste, packaged in a plastic wrapper, for treatment of severe acute malnutrition. Plumpy'Nut is manufactured by Nutriset, a French company. Feeding with the packets of this paste reduces the need for hospitalizati ...

, a Ready-to-Use Therapeutic Food (RUTF), with Dr. Mark Manary.Nutriset
"Nutriset's timeline"
/ref> Starting in 1994, Briend, who at the time worked at

Institut de recherche pour le développement The French National Research Institute for Sustainable Development, or ''Institut de Recherche pour le Développement'' (IRD), is a French science and technology establishment under the joint supervision of the French Ministries of Ministry of ...

, worked with Michel Lescanne to develop variants of renutrition products in solid form. At the time, the WHO-recommended diet for the treatment of severe malnutrition required clean water, a commodity only available in hospitals in most developing countries. These trial products were ultimately discarded for not meeting the requirements of good shelf-life, pleasant taste, or logistic simplicity. In 1996, inspired by a jar of chocolate spread which had a similar composition of proteins, energy, and lipids as the diet recommended by the WHO, Briend came up with the idea of replacing part of the dry skim milk in the existing recipe with

peanut butter Peanut butter is a food Paste (food), paste or Spread (food), spread made from Grinding (abrasive cutting), ground, dry roasting, dry-roasted peanuts. It commonly contains additional ingredients that modify the taste or texture, such as salt, ...

and eventually created

. Briend also served as a medical officer for the Department of Child & Adolescent Health and Development at the

World Health Organization The World Health Organization (WHO) is a list of specialized agencies of the United Nations, specialized agency of the United Nations which coordinates responses to international public health issues and emergencies. It is headquartered in Gen ...

.Terri McClain
"A Recipe to Save Young Lives"
'' Washington University in St. Louis'' ''Magazine'', 2008

References

Living people French nutritionists Year of birth missing (living people) {{France-med-bio-stub