It is not often you hear anyone singing the praises of a food additives, let alone food dye. Brilliant Blue G , the dye found in blue M&Ms and Gatorade, has a lot more going on than a super-awesome, old-school gansta name: it might help to decrease the severity of spinal cord injuries. When the spinal cord is injured, molecular changes occur at the injury site, making the initial injury considerably worse – the body sends healing cells to the site but they go overboard and attack healthy cells as well. When Brilliant Blue G was given intravenously to a rats with spinal injuries, the blue dye inhibited the cellular attack that killed healthy cells. The rats were able to walk postinjury, although they retained a

bit of a limp. The control group, which received no dye, never walked again. The one side effect is that the rats treated with blue dye turned blue for a while. Administering Brilliant Blue G immediately after a spinal cord injury could have a dramatic impact on how accident victims are treated and recover. The group at University of Rochester that made this medical discovery are gearing up for clinical trials . The blue dye has already been approved for human consumption, since it’s in Jell-O, candy, and drinks, so let’s hope the research is funded quickly. It could transforms lives. Takahiro Takano, University of Rochester Medical Center

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Food Dye Brilliant Blue G Reduces Spinal Cord Injuries