Assistant Professor
University of Mississippi
Dr. Nadeeja Wijayatunga is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Nutrition and Hospitality Management at the University of Mississippi since 2019. She is the 2022-2023 Early Career Representative on the Board of Directors of the American Society of Nutrition (ASN), the Past Chair of the Early Career Nutrition (ECN) Interest group of ASN. In addition, she is a committee member of the Dissemination Committee of the Council of Research in the Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics (AND) and the Professional Development Chair-Elect for Mississippi AND.
Nadeeja graduated with PhD in Nutritional Sciences from Texas Tech University and completed her postdoctoral training in the Department of Kinesiology and Sport Management at Texas Tech University. She also completed the Individualized Supervised Practice Pathway Program through Iowa State University and became a registered dietitian in 2022. Before coming to the United States, Nadeeja worked as a faculty member in the Department of Biochemistry in the Medical School of University of Sri Jayewardenepura in Sri Lanka and during that time she completed her Master of Philosophy in Clinical Biochemistry from the University of Sri Jayewardenepura. Upon completion of her medical degree from the University of Peradeniya in Sri Lanka, she did her residency in Medicine and Surgery. and then worked as a medical officer in Intensive care and Anesthesia before joining academia.
Her current research interests are behavioral aspects of unhealthy lean, interventions for obesity, biases in health care i(weight bias and ageism), and time-restricted eating. Recently, she shared her research expertise as a TEDx speaker.