Thanks to a generous partnership with uBiome, the budget will now fund ~15 participants.

Each participant's microbiome will be sampled 7 times, for a total of 105 uBiome sampling kits.

Participants will consume Soylent 2.0, the leading meal-alternative. Nutritional information and composition can be found here.

Recruitment funds will be used to raise awareness and advertise the project to attract candidates for participation. Candidates will learn as part of our student organization in regular meetings about the study and microbiome research overall.

Funds raised past our goal will be used to increase the sample size and fund more participants.

Additional Information

Any additional funds raised past our goal will be used to increase the sample size and increase the number of microbiome measurements we will take.

FAQ

Q: Is 3 days of Soylent long enough to observe a change? Is a sample size of 10 large enough for this study?

A: In our revised study design, participants consume Soylent for 4 days. The protocol we propose is designed similarly to the study here. In this paper, a similar sample size of about 10 participants were given meat-rich or vegetable rich diets for five days, and microbiome compositions were rapidly and reproducibly changed within 2 days. Any funding we raise past our goal will be used to increase our sample size. Citation: David L a, et al. (2014) Diet rapidly and reproducibly alters the human gut microbiome. Nature 505(7484):559–63.

Q: How can you control for Soylent/No Soylent conditions if everybody's microbiome starts off differently?

A: Everybody's microbiome does start off differently. As such, it is impossible to do a real soylent + / - control without somehow duplicating the person and their microbiome. However, out method has two controlled aspects. Firstly, the two days prior to Soylent consumption will provide a baseline microbiome of each participant's unique microbiome, acting as an internal control. The individuals that do not consume Soylent will act as a control for day-to-day variance of microbiome fluctuations.

Q: What about human testing approval?

A:

--Update 10/2016-- We passed our IRB review!

We have an IRB (human experimentation ethics review) underway and will also require Informed Consent approval from each participant before we begin testing. The study is considered minimally invasive since Soylent is regulated as food by the FDA and the uBiome sequencing is done from an external sample.

Interesting Scientific Points

Introduction of Bacteria to Microbiomes: How did so many bacteria get inside of you? From the moment you were born, your body has been collecting bacteria from the environment, which populate both your outside and inside. The main source of bacterial diversity comes from your food. Your body replenishes bacterial diversity from the varieties of food that you eat. Interestingly, Soylent is sterile, which means there are no living bacteria in the drink. This may have interesting effects on the replenishment of bacteria for Soylent drinkers.

Sugars/Carbohydrates: Each species of bacteria has a unique metabolism that determines how well it can utilize the nutrition it is fed. Sugars, or carbohydrates, are the main source of energy for bacteria, and most people have diets that include a wide range of sugars. Soylent is designed with one main sugar, isomaltulose, which may preferentially select for certain bacteria, while negatively affecting other bacteria.

Special thanks to Richard Farman for his great work on the promotional video.

Richard Farman: LinkedIn, farmanrl@whitman.edu