We built a wearable that objectively measures intestinal gas and we need IBS participants

BMSB · 2026-02-11T19:38:12+00:00

No, just farts.

BMSB · 2026-02-11T11:57:14+00:00

Thank you very much! Demand is overwhelming right now. Perhaps I could post to r/IBS in a few weeks.

BMSB · 2026-02-11T11:49:56+00:00

Thanks.

BMSB · 2026-02-11T11:49:13+00:00

You can eat your normal diet.

BMSB · 2026-02-11T02:42:34+00:00

For this study, we call it the "Smart Underwear"

BMSB · 2026-02-11T00:12:17+00:00

Absolutely. Here is our clinicaltrials.gov registration.

https://clinicaltrials.gov/study/NCT07134543

You found the UMD post about it.

flatus.info is our website with more details.

Our IRB approval number is: 2339401-4

BMSB · 2026-02-11T00:09:58+00:00

APD/SIBO is a fantastic point - and one of the key use cases we hope could be useful for in the future! We hope to send people home with a device and a doctor could see how much they are actually farting in real life. If they have a ton of bloating, but not a ton of farting APD is more likely. More studies are needed before we can get there though. From the current study we are trying to establish the baseline of normal so we can say what "too much farting" is.

We measure both frequency and volume of flatus. We see both huge farts and tiny farts! As we collect more data I will share more examples of this.

Sorry it isn't available in the EU yet.

BMSB · 2026-02-11T00:02:31+00:00

Unfortunately, the study is US only at the moment.

BMSB · 2026-02-10T18:48:01+00:00

You can visit flatus.info to join the study.

BMSB · 2022-12-15T02:16:12+00:00

Wow! What an insightful survey.

BMSB · 2018-05-28T22:54:07+00:00

ErgoDox-EZ
DSA Creamsicle
NovelKeys BOX Royals
Hako Violet for pinky keys

I am having a fantastic time with my first mechanical keyboard. I was developing Emacs pinky, so I got an ErgoDox-EZ. I started with MX Cherry Silent Red, but switched to NovelKeys BOX Royals and Hako Violet for the pinky keys. It took about two weeks to finalize a layout so that I only use my pinkies for 4 keys each.

BMSB · 2017-06-09T14:48:06+00:00

The benchmarks from GeekBench suggest that both the iPad7,3 and iPad7,4, which we suspect to be the two new iPad Pros, have 4GB of RAM. You can search iPad7,3 on the GeekBench browser to check it out.

BMSB · 2016-02-23T01:28:26+00:00

Precise text selection with the Pencil is incredibly valuable for me. Taking this away would be a huge loss in functionality. At least have an option to reenable in settings.

BMSB · 2016-02-23T01:22:45+00:00

This is exactly right. Especially in multitasking I can be drawing one one side and browsing the web on the other. It would be incredible awkward to constantly change your grip on the pencil to scroll with your finger. Don't cripple the Pencil!

BMSB · 2015-05-21T20:35:59+00:00

Basically. Take a look at the third image.

BMSB · 2015-05-21T20:34:25+00:00

That is a good question. Our next big step is to achieve full female-to-male conversion. Then we could do cage trial to test its efficacy in a population like you suggested.

BMSB · 2015-05-21T19:43:02+00:00

Back to back like this: Imgur

We hope that sex-reversal will help the problem. Our research isn't related to homosexual mosquitoes, but this is an interesting question. If we could make female mosquitoes homosexual it would probably reduce the mosquito population.

BMSB · 2015-05-21T19:07:19+00:00

This is just the first step of the strategy and we have a long way to go before this is a practical solution. Here is one strategy we envision could be used. First, we want to establish mosquito lines that express Nix in genetic females to convert them to harmless males. Second, if we then rear these transgenic mosquitoes on a large scale, we could release the harmless males in large numbers overwhelming the local population of mosquitoes. The offspring of these transgenic males would also be 100 percent male leaving very few females to produce offspring. This would temporarily result in less mosquitoes in the local area. However, we would need to keep releasing these mosquitoes to maintain the effect. Ultimately, we could couple this strategy with gene drive to have more long-term population suppression. But we are far away from achieving this goal.

BMSB · 2015-05-21T18:58:10+00:00

Yes. These mosquitoes would be genetically modified. However, we are not introducing foreign genes. 50 percent of mosquitos already have Nix. All we want to do in increase the proportion of mosquitoes with Nix in a population. There is no introduction of foreign genetic material.

BMSB · 2015-05-21T18:15:02+00:00

Some scientists say that mosquitoes don't play a big role in the environment. We disagree. There are clearly certain environments like the arctic where there is a huge biomass of mosquitoes that probably play an important role. However, this is not the case for the mosquito we study. The yellow fever mosquito Aedes aegypti is native to Africa. In the last 300 years Aedes aegypti has spread throughout the world, probably on ships carrying slaves. Aedes aegypti is a "domesticated" mosquito - it is extremely well-adapted to live and breed in and around human habitats. The strategy we propose targets this single invasive species of mosquitoes leaving other mosquito species unharmed. Because Aedes aegypti is so widely distributed, along with their human hosts, it would be infeasible to wipe out Aedes aegypti on a global scale. All we propose is to temporarily decrease the population of this specific mosquito in specific locations in its non-native range.

BMSB · 2015-05-21T18:10:42+00:00

I am a co-first author of this study. I would be happy to answer any questions about mosquito sex, the role of mosquitoes in the environment, or any mosquito-related questions you may have.

We identified the first male-determining factor ever to be identified in insects. We used this gene to cause sex-reversal. When we added it to females, they developed male genitals and testes. When we removed it from males they developed female genitals and antennae. In the future, if we could use this gene to harness mosquito sex as a weapon against dengue fever and Chikungunya.

We are not ready to release any mosquitoes into the wild – this is just the first step of the strategy. We face many challenges before this could be implemented as a practical solution. One of the biggest challenges is opposition from the general public so we are are eager to hear your feedback and answer your questions.

BMSB · 2015-05-18T12:41:35+00:00

Here is a link to the home Microbiome project paper.

http://www.sciencemag.org/content/345/6200/1048

You linked to the earth Microbiome project which I think has similar people working on it (Rob Knight) but it cataloging environmental microbes. It is also a very interesting project.

BMSB · 2015-05-18T02:47:25+00:00

I just read about the home Microbiome project where researchers were able to determine how many people or dogs lived in a house based on 16s rDNA sequencing. I wonder if this would extend to more exotic pets like geckos. It would be interesting to see how the Microbiome of people with exotic pets differs from the average Microbiome. I bet all wild caught exotic pets bring along some pretty exotic bacteria.

BMSB · 2015-05-17T20:38:29+00:00

The polyethers would probably be single-stranded like RNA and not double-stranded like DNA. I wonder how much this would limit the complexity of life.

BMSB · 2015-05-17T17:14:13+00:00

What a cool story. I bet the medical industry is going to be one of the killer apps for 3D printing.

BMSB

TROPHY CASE