Robert J. Cousins

Robert J. Cousins was born in 1941 as the only child born to Doris née Sifferlen and C. Robert Cousins.[1][2] His maternal grandparents were immigrants to the United States from Alsace. On his father's side of the family, his heritage is predominantly Scottish, Irish, English, and German.[1] He attended the University of Vermont, graduating with a bachelor's degree in 1963. He completed a master's degree in animal science at the University of Connecticut in 1965, followed by a PhD in nutritional biochemistry at the same university in 1968.[3]

In 1971 he began a position as an assistant professor at Rutgers University in their animal sciences department. While at Rutgers, he researched the metabolism of calcium as well as the heavy metal cadmium. He also studied the absorption of zinc. In 1981, he accepted a job offer from the University of Florida in a newly established endowed chair; he became the Boston Family Professor of Nutrition. At UF, he continued researching zinc and its influence on metallothionein. Cousins served as the editor of the Annual Review of Nutrition from 2005 to 2014.[1]

In 1991 he served as the first elected president of the Federation of American Societies for Experimental Biology. In 1996 he was the president of the American Society for Nutritional Sciences (now the American Society for Nutrition[1] In 2000 he was elected to the National Academy of Sciences.[4] He was awarded the Bristol-Myers Squibb Award in 2003 in the nutrition research section.[1]

In 1965, while Cousins was a student at the University of Connecticut, he met Elizabeth Ward on a blind date. They married in January 1969 in Stamford, Connecticut and have three children. He has an affinity for British sports cars.[1]