Blue-Poo Gut–Brain Study

 

 

What can your gut reveal about the way you think?

Did you know that your gut and brain are constantly communicating with each other?

Researchers at the GIBA Network+ and University of Southampton are exploring whether the speed that food moves through your gut is linked to how quickly and accurately you can complete simple thinking tasks.

Taking part is simple and safe: you’ll eat a blue muffin, wait for your poo to turn blue, and then complete a series of short online brain games. By joining people taking part across the UK, you’ll help researchers better understand the connection between the gut and the brain.

 

What is the study investigating?

Scientists have discovered that the time food spends travelling through your gut, known as gut transit time, may influence the microbes living in your digestive system and how these microbes process the food to produce chemicals that influence your brain. Researchers now want to find out whether gut transit time might also be linked to cognitive function, including attention, processing speed and decision-making.

The study will use two simple tools:

• A blue muffin test to measure how quickly food moves through your gut

• Short game-like tasks that measures attention and mental processing speed

 

What will I need to do?

Step 1: Eat a blue muffin 🧁

You’ll eat one muffin containing a safe, food-grade blue colouring. The dye passes naturally through your digestive system and helps researchers estimate your gut transit time.

Click here to download our blue muffin recipe

Step 2: Watch for blue poo 🚽

After eating the muffin, you’ll simply keep an eye out for the first appearance of blue colouring in your stool.

When you see it, record the date and time on the study website. This tells researchers how long the muffin took to travel through your digestive system.

Step 3: Complete a short brain game 🎮

On the website, you’ll answer a few questions about yourself and your health, then complete a series of quick, fun, online thinking tests that take around five minutes to complete.

Who can take part?

You may be able to participate if you:

✅ Are aged 5 to 85 years

✅ Can understand English

✅ Do not have a diagnosed gastrointestinal condition

✅ Do not have a diagnosed neurological or cognitive condition

✅ Have not taken antibiotics recently

✅ Are not currently taking probiotics

Children can take part with permission from a parent or guardian.

 

Ready to get involved?

Click here to read our information sheets for adults and children.

Once you’re ready, we invite you to bake and eat a blue muffin using our study recipe, which is available here.

You can then click here to load our study website, enter your details and play our brain game.

 

Questions?

If you’d like more information about the study, please contact the research team: contact@giba-uk.org

Visit the post-study page to learn about the study result by clicking the link below.

Post-study result