Let’s break wind – for science!
This is Sandra Tsing Loh with the Loh Down on Science.
Intimate question: How many times do you fart a day?
Santiago Botasini and team at the University of Maryland are sniffing out the facts.
For a month, they had volunteers wear SMART underwear – or FART underwear – equipped with a tiny gas sensor.
And? Participants averaged about thirty-two farts a day – twice what was expected! Add fiber gummies and almost all were tooting up a storm… except for a mysterious few.
These “Zen Digesters” barely fart even on high-fiber diets, while others are “hyperproducers.” By studying these extremes with Smart Underwear, scientists can define healthy baselines and track gut health.
Peuw! Can your Apple Watch do that?!
Reference: Botasini, S., Zhan, D., Fischer, N., Ravel, C. T., Tien, A., Grant, M. R., Ndjite, G. M., Sopko, T., Childs, H., Greenfield, M., Qian, C. X., Gardiner, K. E., Anders, N. M., Ullah, T. F., Redmond, L. T., Callaway, D. A., Behailu, E. M., Sarkar, G. M., Sany, N. C., Slavin, M., … Hall, B. (2025). *Smart underwear: A novel wearable for long-term monitoring of gut microbial gas production via flatus*. **Biosensors and Bioelectronics: X, 27**, 100699.