The company wants to find out just how healthy nutritional food and drinks are

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Nestlé will soon begin testing its products on human brain and liver cells, reports The Wall Street Journal, in a bid to find out exactly how healthy foods and drinks are good for us.

The food products giant will obtain the cells from a biotech firm to examine how nutritionally enhanced drinks, smoothies and other products can have medical benefits. Nestlé’s deal to obtain the stem-cell-like cells made from mature human cells from Cellular Dynamics International Inc. will be officially announced this week, according to the WSJ.

Nestlé competitors like the yogurt giant Danone have also been investing in nutrition or medically enhanced products, with the worldwide market for health and wellness food and beverages is forecast to grow from $772 billion in 2013 to $944 billion in 2018.

There’s some skepticism about the direct effect certain food ingredients might have on diseases, a professor of nutrition at New York University told the WSJ, but meanwhile, Nestlé will begin in earnest testing the how fatty acids in avocados and olive oil interact with neurons in human cells.

[WSJ]