British Gut was set up in 2014 by Tim Spector, Department of Twin Research at King’s College London in collaboration with Dr Rob Knight funder of American Gut project, University of California San Diego. Its aim is to map the gut microbiome of the British population following on the work of American Gut, which has already collected thousands of samples from US volunteers.

British Gut is unique in this field as it is a crowdfunded project based on Open Access principles. It is fully funded by participants who donate the biological samples and finance the subsequent analyses. Upon collection and analysis, these data are made available to scientists from all over the world to help advance our understanding in this exciting new field. The higher the number of samples we collect the higher the potential for new discoveries. Not only does this enable participants to contribute directly to science but they will also receive a personalised breakdown of their own microbial population and see how it compares with the guts of thousands of other people within the UK.

The human microbiome is complex and up to now our understanding of its role in our body was limited, but we are starting to see the immense possibilities and how much our health depends on this forgotten organ. We believe that our work in this field will contribute to improve our wellbeing and that of generations to come.

Our microbiomes are about to get the spotlight in the word of science that they deserve.