Saturday, August 3, 2013

In the News--50 year old fluoride mystery closer to being solved



Researchers believe fluoride helps prevent cavities because fluoride helps keep the bacteria from sticking to teeth.  They pointed out studying teeth is difficult because teeth vary among people.  They used artificial teeth made from hydroxyapatite (one of the main ingredients of tooth enamel).  They polished the artificial teeth to a fine finish, and then exposed some to fluoride before applying bacteria. The fluoride-coated teeth had decreased bacteria sticking to them.  This study can be found at http://pubs.acs.org/doi/abs/10.1021/la4008558?prevSearch=fluoride&searchHistoryKey=

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