Americans seem to love to criticize and belittle others by referring to them as either being a dumb a** or a smart a**. We also hear people saying that someone has their head up their a** or that they are sitting on their brains.

These are never meant as a compliment, but a new discovery could change the whole perception of what being a smart a** really is or what it means to sit on one’s brain.

Scientists already knew that there was a bundle of nerve cells, often referred to as a second brain located in the human body. This group of neurons is located in the colon. They knew that this second brain is not connected to the body’s central nervous system (brain and spinal cord), but operates separately. The second brain is considered to be part of the enteric nervous system. They knew that the function of this second brain was to control the contraction of muscles associates with the colon that helps the body poop.

No, this second brain in the butt does not have anything to do with one’s wiggle or twerking abilities, but has a lot to do with keeping you empty and regular.

A team of researchers at Flinders University, Australia, used high resolution neuronal imaging to study what some jokingly refer to as the butt brain. They discovered that the butt brain actually sends rhythmic impulses to gut. This may sound that significant, but lead researchers Nick J Spencer, a neurophysiology professor, explains:

“This represents a major pattern of neuronal activity in the mammalian peripheral nervous system that has not previously been identified.”

“One of the great mysteries of the gastrointestinal tract is how such a large populations of enteric neurons (that lie within the gut wall) actually fire action potentials to generate contractions of the smooth muscle cells, enabling propulsion of colonic content.”

However, there is more. Emeran Mayer, professor of physiology, psychiatry and behavioral science at the David School of Medicine at UCLA, added:

“The system is way too complicated to have evolved only to make sure things move out of your colon. A big part of our emotions are probably influenced by the nerves in our gut.”

If not for your butt brain, having a bowel movement would be far more difficult than it is.

I can’t help but wonder if knowing the function, and how it functions, the second brain could lead to more effective ways to control diarrhea or fight against constipation?

As much as the human body has been studied and examined over the past century, there are always new things to learn, indicating that our bodies are far more complex than anything that could have evolved by random chance. It just keeps adding proof that we were wonderfully designed.