He is Professor Emeritus in Nutrition and Pediatrics at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.
from Harvard Medical School in 1975, was a resident in pediatrics at Yale University from 1975 to 1977, and earned his Ph.D. in nutrition at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in 1980.
He served as chair of the Department of Nutrition at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill from 1990 to 2005.
He was also the director UNC Human Clinical Nutrition Research Center and the director UNC Center for Excellence in Children's Nutrition at the School of Public Health at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.
Zeisel is a member of the World Cancer Research Fund's Expert Panel on “Food, Nutrition and the Prevention of Cancer: A Global Perspective.” He serves as the principal investigator on multiple federally funded research projects that focus on human requirements for choline and the effects of this nutrient on brain development.