Nutrigenomics is the science that examines the response of individuals to dietary compounds, foods and diets using post-genomic and related technologies. It aims to determine the influence of common dietary ingredients on the genome. This new understanding of health and disease will lead to innovative developments in human medicine, agricultural biotechnology, food quality and safety, new food products, biomarker development and nutritional interventions. Unbalanced nutrient intakes are known to be associated with the development of chronic diseases demonstrating that dietary chemicals have direct effects on molecular genetic processes. Nutrigenomics is a potentially promising development in emerging functional food and nutraceutical research.