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Microbes that cause cavities can form superorganisms able to ‘crawl’

penntoday.upenn.edu

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Re: Microbes that cause cavities can form superorganisms able to ‘crawl’

#51

Post by xboxnolifes »

Waterluvian wrote: post #36

Anecdotally, I’m having one hell of a time with my 3yo and 5yo’s teeth. No juice. No soda. No bad snacks. Lots of dentist recommended foods and snacks. Full brushing and flossing regimen. Fluoride. Dentist applied special fluoride treatments. Trust me when I say we’re doing everything right. And yet they’re 3 and 5 and have had so many cavities. I asked my dad about it and he said my brothers and I had, frankly, poor…

Have you moved to an area with a different water source than your childhood? Like switching from city water to well water, or vice versa?

Re: Microbes that cause cavities can form superorganisms able to ‘crawl’

#52

Post by cosmojg »

at_a_remove wrote: post #39
fbdab103 wrote: post #20

Years ago, I recall reading about a putative Cavity Vaccine which was a bateriophage which targeted the tiny fraction of species present in the mouth responsible for tooth decay. Supposedly, a one time inoculation would confer lifelong protection. It has been decades and I have not heard anything more about this. Big Dentist keeping the research down or was there some "in mice" kind of gotcha which limited the treatm…

I tracked down the guy who invented this, if this is the version you're thinking of, and wrote him. It wasn't a vaccine so much as it was a replacement of your oral flora and fauna with a non-cavity causing bacteria. This was maybe twelve years ago, but he said essentially that the FDA really really really didn't like the idea, and he had to sell off bits and pieces of the concept.

This sounds amazing! Got any more info? Where can I find this guy and his patents? I wonder if I can whip something up at home...

Re: Microbes that cause cavities can form superorganisms able to ‘crawl’

#53

Post by b4je7d7wb »

Waterluvian wrote: post #36

Anecdotally, I’m having one hell of a time with my 3yo and 5yo’s teeth. No juice. No soda. No bad snacks. Lots of dentist recommended foods and snacks. Full brushing and flossing regimen. Fluoride. Dentist applied special fluoride treatments. Trust me when I say we’re doing everything right. And yet they’re 3 and 5 and have had so many cavities. I asked my dad about it and he said my brothers and I had, frankly, poor…

I visit the dentist once every 5 years or so.

No cavities so far. Last time i checked I was 25 years old. I brush my teeth once a day.

I consider myself lucky, since my siblings have had a couple cavities. My mother attributes this to her being very careful when we were babies to not share any spoons to give us some bacteria from saliva.

Re: Microbes that cause cavities can form superorganisms able to ‘crawl’

#54

Post by bmau5 »

Waterluvian wrote: post #36

Anecdotally, I’m having one hell of a time with my 3yo and 5yo’s teeth. No juice. No soda. No bad snacks. Lots of dentist recommended foods and snacks. Full brushing and flossing regimen. Fluoride. Dentist applied special fluoride treatments. Trust me when I say we’re doing everything right. And yet they’re 3 and 5 and have had so many cavities. I asked my dad about it and he said my brothers and I had, frankly, poor…

Any chance they are mouth-breathing at night? It can lead to a shift in pH in the mouth which may increase risk of cavities [1]

[1] https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/26666708/

Re: Microbes that cause cavities can form superorganisms able to ‘crawl’

#55

Post by syntheweave »

miketery wrote: post #44
thelittleone wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A fascinating field of inquiry. Digestive systems and their inhabitants have evolved over millions of years. I recently shifted my mindset to feed not just for me, but also for the ~2kg of microbiota [1] inhabiting my digestive system. Has been great for my health. [1] https://www.racgp.org.au/afp/2017/april/the-gut-microbiome/

What sort of foods do you recommend? I've heard good things about yogurt, cottage cheese, and kimchi; but don't know for certain.

Diluted vinegar; not a lot, not every meal, but a little bit once a day(I usually take it with canned seltzer water at dinnertime). It's the oldest recorded all-purpose tonic and it has a very clear purpose in digestive health by biasing the body's pH balance a little more acidic, which makes some foods easier to stomach, and also pushes the adaptive fitness of the gut.

While the scientific framework I'm building off of is patchy, I think of the gut biome as something you have to "train up" to give effective responses instead of dumping its issues onto other regulatory mechanisms, so exposing it to a variety of training scenarios would be an instrumental part of that, and it probably wouldn't be a factor of specific foods so much as general %s of fiber, fat, acidity, salinity, etc.

Re: Microbes that cause cavities can form superorganisms able to ‘crawl’

#56

Post by novax81 »

Waterluvian wrote: post #45
sidlls wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Could be something has changed, or else something else is at work. I had wretched teeth throughout my youth and through my late 20s. I have 8 or 9 crowns maybe 16 teeth, a few with fillings; some were pulled for orthodontic work. Then about 10 years ago I stopped regular dental hygiene practices: I brush my teeth once a day (most days) and rarely floss. Haven't had a "watch" in years since I dropped the practice of f…

I’ve flirted with conspiracy-like thoughts on the dental industry and how they might be “confidently wrong” about things the way the rest of the medical industry famously has been on numerous topics over the centuries. I wondered (with absolutely no basis in fact) things like, “maybe the calcified tartar forms a barrier?”

Man I hate this line of thought because I completely fall into it too, haha. For a really, really long period of life, I had just awful dental hygiene practices. Honestly don't even want to describe it because it makes me a little disgusted with myself (ironically, in a way). But, I also never had dental issues. Ate whatever, drank whatever, didn't care.

Then a few years ago I get my shit together more and start a daily routine. A few months in, I finally visit a dentist for, I swear, the first time in a decade. I'm expecting them to find the motherload of disease in there, but nope. They tell me everything looks fine, except for a tiny bit of gingivitis. Take some x-rays and I'm on my way. 6 months later, worst head pain of my life turns out to be a deep one that needs a root canal. Now I've got a bunch of fillings, a crown, etc.

I still brush daily and my mouth feels like shit if I go without for a few days. I know in all logical ways, it's just a string of luck and coincidence. But damn does the conspiracy part of the brain start spinning up on my anecdotal experiences... lol.

Re: Microbes that cause cavities can form superorganisms able to ‘crawl’

#57

Post by CrHn3 »

Waterluvian wrote: post #36

Anecdotally, I’m having one hell of a time with my 3yo and 5yo’s teeth. No juice. No soda. No bad snacks. Lots of dentist recommended foods and snacks. Full brushing and flossing regimen. Fluoride. Dentist applied special fluoride treatments. Trust me when I say we’re doing everything right. And yet they’re 3 and 5 and have had so many cavities. I asked my dad about it and he said my brothers and I had, frankly, poor…

It is my understanding (from reading Kiss Your Dentist Goodbye) that bacteria is seeded from primary caregivers in the first year of life, and it can be difficult to modify them after this, but it’s possible.

My sister has impeccable dental hygiene and many cavities. Her children have had anesthesia because they needed so much dental work. I’m the kind of person who would floss once a year and never had a cavity until I was 28 and drinking many acidic diet sodas. I started the book’s regimen using xylitol, eating basic foods like chocolate and cheese after acidic foods and drinks, took Florassist dental probiotic and stayed on top of cleanings and have had less problems since. My child is okay so far despite some not so great habits. I get extra cleanings that first year and make sure other caregivers do too.

Re: Microbes that cause cavities can form superorganisms able to ‘crawl’

#58

Post by spockz »

im3w1l wrote: post #35
semperdark wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

True, though largely limited to DNA necessary for its functions. I don’t have a citation on me (mobile) but there’s evidence that more “generic” mitochondrial DNA was integrated into the nuclear DNA, and that this is also the case for other endosymbionts.

I have a hypothesis for why this happens. Sexual reproduction has a very neat property: Recombination. Two individuals that each have one harmful mutation can through recombination have offspring without either of them. This allows removal of harmful mutations from the gene pool without terminating someones entire lineage - important when every generation comes with a decade of mutations, unlike microorganisms that a…

> > In the last 190 million years, the number of genes on the Y has plummeted from more than 1,000 to roughly 50, a loss of more than 95 percent.

How much of this has happened in the recent human history? Are we becoming less “manly”?

Re: Microbes that cause cavities can form superorganisms able to ‘crawl’

#59

Post by phailhaus »

Waterluvian wrote: post #36

Anecdotally, I’m having one hell of a time with my 3yo and 5yo’s teeth. No juice. No soda. No bad snacks. Lots of dentist recommended foods and snacks. Full brushing and flossing regimen. Fluoride. Dentist applied special fluoride treatments. Trust me when I say we’re doing everything right. And yet they’re 3 and 5 and have had so many cavities. I asked my dad about it and he said my brothers and I had, frankly, poor…

> But I cannot shake the feeling that something significant has changed in the last 30 years.

This doesn't make sense unless everyone around you also suddenly got more cavities recently. If you ask around more, you'll find that there have always been people with good hygiene that get more cavities, and others that don't seem to get them despite poor habits. It may be related your specific oral bacterial biome, or diet.

Re: Microbes that cause cavities can form superorganisms able to ‘crawl’

#60

Post by dennis_jeeves1 »

cosmojg wrote: post #52
at_a_remove wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I tracked down the guy who invented this, if this is the version you're thinking of, and wrote him. It wasn't a vaccine so much as it was a replacement of your oral flora and fauna with a non-cavity causing bacteria. This was maybe twelve years ago, but he said essentially that the FDA really really really didn't like the idea, and he had to sell off bits and pieces of the concept.

This sounds amazing! Got any more info? Where can I find this guy and his patents? I wonder if I can whip something up at home...

Count me in, I too am interested.
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