Dr. Sondra L. King had traveled little outside the U.S. before 1984, when a Methodist minister from her church invited her, as a nutritionist, to accompany him on a mission to Costa Rica.

"They traveled into villages and rural areas," said her daughter Karisa, "and it was an eye-opening experience for her."

Through the many years after that journey, Dr. King became a specialist in global nutrition issues as she traveled to numerous Third World countries, conducting research projects with non-profit groups to improve the nutrition of impoverished children.

Dr. King, 63, of DeKalb, a retired associate professor in Northern Illinois University's School of Family, Consumer and Nutrition Sciences, died of a heart attack caused by a blood clot Wednesday, March 16, in Swedish American Hospital in Rockford.

"Sondra was the most wonderful, kind and caring person I have ever met," said associate professor Aimee Prawitz, a colleague who helped her design and tabulate results on several projects.

"What a big impact she made. She cared so much about the children. We talk about world hunger, but Sondra was one of those who put her money where her mouth was--she went over there and did something about it."

Among the projects Dr. King worked on was improving the lunches offered to children in a child-care facility in Nukus, Uzbekistan. The facility could spend only 4 cents per child per day.

Before her project, the lunch was bread, a piece of hard candy and black tea. With Prawitz's help, Dr. King found food in local villages that would be more nutritious but not cost any more. The daily offering became a boiled egg, green salad and tomatoes, yogurt and a half-cup of milk for each child.

"The last we heard, the owners of the facility were trying to raise their own chickens and start their own garden," Prawitz said.

In 2002, Dr. King traveled to Panama for six months to research the results of adding a byproduct of malt flour to the porridge of weaning babies.

"What often happens in Third World countries, is that nursing mothers become pregnant, so they stop nursing and wean their babies from the family table," Prawitz said. "That usually means some cereal-based porridge that little babies cannot swallow, so mothers thin the cereal with water. But the water is contaminated with parasites."

A small amount of the flour byproduct added to any grain-based porridge thins it, making it more digestible, she said.

Dr. King's work also took her to Guatemala, Nicaragua, El Salvador, China, Ghana and the Dominican Republic.

She was born in Pampa, Texas, and raised in the small Texas town of Canyon, where she excelled in science as a student. She received a bachelor's degree in science from West Texas State University and married Albert King in 1960. The couple divorced in 1982.

She and her husband lived in Georgia, where she taught high school biology, and then Texas, where she taught the same subject. She also received a doctorate in food science. In 1976, she and her husband joined the staff at Northern Illinois University. She retired in 2002.

In the U.S., she helped out at food pantries and shelters, and was a lay minister and outreach worker for her Methodist church.

She loved to sing, play the piano and drive her 1949 Packard in vintage car events.

Other survivors include a daughter, Kimi King; her mother, Janney Bee Hines; two brothers, Mike and Steve Hines; a granddaughter; and her fiance, Arthur Webb. Services have been held.

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