Arkansas Children’s Nutrition Center (ACNC):
is one of six centers in the National Human Nutrition Research Center's (HNRCs) Program funded through the Agriculture Research Service (ARS) within the USDA. The centers are:

• Beltsville Human Nutrition Research Center (HNRC), established in 1941 in Beltsville, Maryland
• Grand Forks HNRC, established in 1977 in Grand Forks, North Dakota
• Children’s HNRC, established 1979 in Houston, Texas
• Jean Mayer HNRC on Aging, established in 1980 in Boston, Massachusetts
• The Western HNRC, established in 1980 in Davis, California
• Arkansas Children’s Nutrition Center established in 1995 in Little Rock, Arkansas.

There has been an intramural human nutrition research program within the USDA for more than 60 years. Several special Congressional acts have guided the creation of what is the current program, including the acts of 1977 and 1985 that established the USDA as the lead agency of the government for human nutrition research and further legislated the establishment of a separate and distinct mission within the USDA for research into food and nutrition. The federal legislation states specifically that the emphasis should be on nutritional needs of normal, healthy individuals and not biomedical aspects of human nutrition concerned with diagnosis or treatment of disease. While these latter two points are generally considered to be within the mission of the National Institutes of Health, the prevention of disease through diet and nutrition is within the mission of the USDA HNRC program.

ACNC is the newest of the Human Nutrition Research Centers (HNRCs) and only the second to focus on pediatric nutrition. It is unique in terms of its' research areas. Unlike the buildings at the other HNRCs which were constructed with federal appropriations through the USDA, the research facilities at the ACNC are being constructed with private contributions raised through the Arkansas Children’s Hospital.

In 1995, the original fully funded level was envisioned to be $15.8M annually.  However, funding started at $1M in 1995 and has grown to $6.2M annually, with several expansions necessary in all areas. When fully funded, research will focus on the five areas of:

• Brain Development and Function (i.e., language acquisition, cognition, etc.)
• Disease Prevention
• Bone Development and Remodeling
• Enhancement of Immune Function
• Body Composition (i.e., obesity)

Currently, the Center is funded at approximately one-fourth of the anticipated total level, with the first two areas (Brain Development and Function, and Disease Prevention) being actively funded.