Professor Caryn Zinn PhD, Professor of Nutrition, NZ Registered Dietician
Caryn Zinn is a Professor of Nutrition at AUT and a New Zealand Registered Dietitian with over 25 years of experience in nutrition research and practice. Her work focuses on whole-food nutrition and holistic lifestyle strategies in the context of metabolic health.
A recognised leader in therapeutic carbohydrate reduction, Caryn is Editor-in-Chief of the Journal of Metabolic Health, a Director of the New Zealand Metabolic Health Charitable Trust, WholeNZ and co-author of the best-selling What the Fat? series. Her work continues to influence clinical practice and public health nutrition globally.
Presentations
- November 2025: Can I take a photo of that? Dishing up AI for nutritional value … Digital Health Week, NZ (New Zealand)
- October 2025: Diabetes Down Under … Kiwi Innovation in Primary Care. Low Carb Down Under (Australia)
- October 2025: Nutrition and healing in older adults. Hand Physiotherapy New Zealand Conference (New Zealand)
- July 2025: Managing Weight in Osteoarthritis. Lifestyle and the Role of Medications in a Changing Landscape. Aotearoa Osteoarthritis Summit (New Zealand)
- January 2025: Diabetes innovation in New Zealand – Building better care one practice at a time… AMHS Grand rounds (Virtual)
A low-carb dietician’s perspective – Low Carb Down Under
Authored papers
- Prediabetes is pre-nothing: Call it early type 2 diabetes (Journal of Metabolic Health, 2025)
- Redefining Diabetes Care: Evaluating the Impact of a Carbohydrate-Reduction, Health Coach Approach Model in New Zealand (Diabetes Research, 2024)
- Carbohydrate reduction and a holistic model of care in diabetes management: Insights from a retrospective multi-year audit in New Zealand (Nutrients, 2025)
- Beyond NOVA: Reimagining Food Processing Classification with the CHIPS (Combining Health, Intuition, Processing and Science) Framework (Preprints 2025).
- Artificial intelligence applications for assessing ultra-processed food consumption: A scoping review (British Journal of Nutrition, 2025)
- Assessing the nutrient composition of a carnivore diet: A case study model (Nutrients, 2025)
- All other publications can be found here https://academics.aut.ac.nz/caryn.zinn/publications
Media mentions
- News Talk ZB (New Zealand) interview: Diet, lifestyle, weight loss drugs(2025) https://www.iheart.com/podcast/1049-kerre-woodham-mornings-po-46787367/episode/caryn-zinn-dietician-and-co-author-of-283683869/
- Radio New Zealand interview: New research in Aotearoa on how to reverse Type 2 diabetes (2024)https://www.podchaser.com/podcasts/afternoons-31997/episodes/new-research-in-aotearoa-on-ho-200073773
- TVNZ documentary Counting the Beat (2025). Nutrition and T2Diabetes. https://www.tvnz.co.nz/shows/counting-the-beat/episodes/s1-e4