The research
Every number, traceable
Every part of the score comes from published science. Here is what's behind each piece, and how Bazu uses it.
A wellness tool, not a medical device. Findings are associations, not medical advice.
The glucose curve
How Bazu estimates a food's blood-sugar response, its shape, height, and timing.
The shape of the curve across more than 1,000 foods in healthy people. Sugary foods dip below baseline, starchy foods stay above it, which is how each curve gets its rise, peak, and tail.
Post-meal glucose peak timing by glycemic index. Sets how fast each curve rises and decays.
24-hour glucose profiles in non-diabetic adults. Sets the fasting baseline the curve returns to.
Continuous glucose monitoring in people without diabetes. Confirms typical peak height and return-to-baseline.
The dawn phenomenon. Shapes the natural morning rise in the all-day estimated curve.
Reference GI and GL values for foods, the starting point for a meal's glucose load.
Eating protein and vegetables before carbs lowers the meal's rise, the basis for the meal-order insight.
The Bazu Score, on the label
The penalties and bonuses read straight from the nutrition facts.
The clinical backbone: glucose management, added sugar, saturated fat, and minimally processed foods. Cited across the score's levers.
Fiber and whole grains carry the strongest outcome evidence. The basis for treating fiber as the counterweight to a food's carb load.
The carb-to-fiber ratio for telling refined from whole-grain foods. Behind the carb-quality lever.
Daily added-sugar limits. All sugar counts toward the score, added sugar judged hardest against this line.
The per-serving claim lines (low sodium, low saturated fat, low calorie) that decide when a serving is judged in full.
The heart guardrail for saturated fat, and the fat-quality judgment for fat-rich foods.
Unsaturated fat is the fat worth eating, the basis for the good-fats bonus.
Daily sodium limits behind the sodium penalty.
Fiber intake targets. Sets the fiber bonus.
Protein and satiety. Sets the gated protein bonus.
Charges energy density per 100 g, the model for Bazu's calorie penalty on refined foods.
A second front-of-pack system that charges energy density, corroborating the calorie penalty.
Free-sugar and general dietary guidance behind the score's direction.
Long-term risk of ultra-processed diets, the basis for flagging processed products.
Beyond the label
The handful of ingredients that move a score in ways the nutrition facts can't show.
Advises against artificial sweeteners for long-term health, the basis for the sweetener strike.
Advises limiting foods high in saturated fat, the basis for the deep-fried strike.
Isolated fibers must prove a benefit to count as fiber. Behind the isolated-fiber discount and the refined-starch flag.
Maltodextrin digests faster than table sugar while the label still counts it as ordinary carbs. Why refined starches read as the fastest carbs.
High dietary phosphorus is tied to higher all-cause mortality. Behind the small penalty for added phosphates.
The ingredient check
How additives are tiered on the separate Clean axis, from health and safety bodies.
Cancer-hazard classifications for specific additives.
The international expert body on food-additive safety and acceptable intakes.
Re-evaluations and intake limits for E-numbers across the EU.
US approvals and the GRAS list for additives and colors.
Toxicology reports informing higher-risk tiers.
Substances known to cause cancer or reproductive harm, a source for avoid-tier flags.
An independent additive-safety rating we cross-reference.
A second independent additive database we cross-reference.
Where the food data comes from
The nutrition and product databases Bazu reads before it scores anything.
See the science in action
Scan any food and watch Bazu turn these papers into one clear number
