Savor New Flavors-Train your taste buds!

Taste Buds That Are Located On Your Tongue

Ever since you were a kid, you've known that sugar is bad for your teeth.  Even so, who can resist a sweet now & then?  But people with high blood pressure,diabetes,cardiovascular diseases, and other health challenges sometimes have to adjust their diets and refrain their taste buds to appreciate flavors they might otherwise avoid.
The transition need not be painful.....

                          1) Experimenting with aroma,texture,shape,and color can all improve anyone's dining experience.

                           2) Scientist say humans can detect six distinct tastes: sweet,sour salty,fat, bitter, and umami which means "savory" in Japanese.  You can mix "n" match foods and seasonings that are healthful and yet appeal to your palate.

                           3) Nutritionist say your taste buds will adjust in only 3-5 servings!

YOUR HEALTH, YOUR TEETH, AND ALL OF US SALUTE YOUR GOOD TASTE

ICE CREAM OWWW!

How fast can you say SPHENOPALATINE GANGLIONEURAGLIA ?
It's the scientific name for "brain freeze".  It happens when you eat something very cold very quickly.  You can try pressing your tongue to the roof of your mouth to warm it, but it's best to eat things like ice cream slowly to avoid the discomfort which weirdly, you feel in your forehead.
That's because when the affected blood vessels signal the largest cranial nerve, your brain interprets the pain as a headache.  The trigeminal nerve is also the culprit behind many head, neck, and face aches that are actually generated by the trigeminal jaw joint.  It is no wonder that some suffers of Temporomandibular Joint Disease (TMD), a dysfunction of the jaw, don't think to ask their dentist.
ASK US.  WE'LL INFORM YOUR BRAIN< NOT FREEZE IT !

Pufferfish At The "Beak" Of Evolution: Why Humans Don't Replace Their Teeth

Puffer Fish

Science News

 

ScienceDaily (May 14, 2012) — Prickly pufferfish could hold the key to why humans do not continually replace their teeth and may lead to advances in dental therapies.

New research focusing on tooth development in the deadly fish -unchanged through evolution -- shows that after the first generation of teeth the programme for continued tooth replacement modifies to form a distinctive and unusual `parrot like´ beak.
The study, which is the first time scientists have analysed the development of the fish´s unique beak, also supports the idea that evolution doesn´t make jumps, as its distinctive bite has been modified from a set of genes responsible for tooth development and preserved over 400 million years.

"As humans only replace their teeth once, fishes and pufferfish in particular, can be looked at as a new model to help us to answer questions like how continuous tooth replacement programmes are maintained throughout life? This would help our understanding of why humans have lost this replacement potential, and furthermore how can we use knowledge of the genetic underpinnings of tooth replacement in fishes to facilitate advances in dental therapies."
Pufferfish are bony fish, which are extremely diverse and make up almost half of all living vertebrates. This group uses a highly conserved process to form a unique beak-like jaw that has made teeth in all vertebrates -- animals with spines -- for millions of years.
The research catalogued the dental development throughout all stages of the pufferfish´s growth, from the production of initial-teeth to the construction of its distinctive `beak´. The research showed that the strange structure didn´t appear from scratch during embryonic development as a complete vertebrate novelty, but rather originates from the modified development of replacement teeth after the formation of an initial dentition, which appears like `normal´ fish teeth.

Pufferfishes are the most bizarre of the bony fishes and have recently become a useful genetic model with the pufferfish genome project near completion. It is hoped it will provide a valuable model system for genetics, genomics, biomedical sciences and now development, not to mention the importance of this group to our understanding of the evolution of morphological novelty and vertebrate diversity.

HAPPY MOTHER"S DAY!

Happy Mother's Day to all our wonderful Mom's! Dr. Kathie & Team

Toothbrushes Through the Ages

National Museum of Dentistry

Toothbrushes through the ages, from left to right:
Siwak sticks, or "chew sticks," like those on the far left and far right have been used since Babylonian times, particularly among Muslim and African cultures.
Taub's patent toothbrush had a convex, semicircular design made to conform to the tongue side of the teeth. This early 20th-century design was made out of celluloid.
Next is a rubber-tipped combination gum-stimulator and toothbrush with an aluminum handle, pre-1945.
The Strockway rotary toothbrush was designed with long and short bristle tufts to enable them to go over and in between the teeth as the toothbrush was rolled along the teeth. Circa 1950s.
Dr. Mayland's toothbrush with rubber points instead of bristles, circa 1920s.
The Rotor toothbrush was designed to clean the teeth vertically, circa 1930s.

George Washington's Dentures Were Made of Hippopotamus Ivory, Not Wood!

 

 

George Washington's Lower Dentures, Perched atop a $1.00 Bill

 

The question of what President George Washington's false teeth were made of may be the oldest bit of trivia in the United States. But at the National Museum of Dentistry, it's anything but a trivial matter — the teeth are the star exhibit.
The Baltimore museum proudly displays Washington's dentures, which are made not of wood, but of a more exotic and lasting material: hippopotamus ivory.
An affiliate of the Smithsonian Institution, the museum brands itself as "the Smile Experience."
"We have a really light-hearted and humorous approach to the history of dentistry and all things tooth-related," says Amy Pelsinsky, the museum's director of communications.
The exhibits include Queen Victoria's personal dental instruments; a display of toothbrushes throughout the ages; and a narwhal — an Arctic whale with a six-foot tooth growing out of its head.
Roughly 10,000 people visit the National Museum of Dentistry annually. Many of them are kids, who can don lab coats to "play dentist" and learn how to floss and brush properly on a giant mouth. Those old enough to remember the tunes can sing along to old toothpaste commercials.
By far the biggest draw, though, is Washington's dentures, which were fashioned by his favorite dentist in Philadelphia. Washington needed them badly, Pelsinsky says. Despite writing in his diaries that he used toothbrushes, Washington had only one tooth in his mouth by the time he was inaugurated in 1789.
"We think he had many illnesses throughout his life, you know, it was tough living back then," Pelsinsky says. "And the medicine was tough too, that people took. And the medicine actually made your teeth fall out."

Concerns w/ Sports & Energy Drinks

Energy Drinks

A recent study published in the May/June 2012 issue of General Dentistry, the peer reviewed clinical journal of the Academy of General Dentistry, found that an alarming increase in the consumption of sports and energy drinks, especially among adolescents, is causing irreversible damage to teeth-specifically, the high acidity levels in the drinks erode tooth enamel, the glossy outer layer of the tooth.
 

Sports Drinks

 Researchers examined the acidity levels in 13 sports drinks and 9 energy drinks.  They found the acidity levels can vary b/n brands of beverages and flavor of the same brand. They found that damage to enamel was evident after only 5 days of exposure to sports or energy drinks, although energy drinks showed a significantly greater potential to damage teeth than sport drinks.  In fact, the authors found that energy drinks caused twice as much damage to teeth as sports drinks.
With a reported 30-50% of U.S. teens consuming energy drinks and as many as 62% consuming @ least one sports drink / day.  It is important to educate parents and young adults about the downside of these drinks.  Damage caused to tooth enamel is irreversible, ans without the protection of enamel, teeth become sensitive & prone to cavities.
Dentist should review the diets & snacking habits of their teen/adolescent patients and then discuss their consumptions of these beverages.  They don't realize that something as seemingly harmless as a sport or energy drink can do a lot damage to their teeth.

Recommendations :
1) Minimize the intake of sport and energy drinks.
2) Chew sugar-free gum or rinse the mouth with water following consumption of the drinks.
* Both tactics increase saliva flow, which naturally helps to return the acidity levels in the mouth to normal.
**Also, patients should wait @ least an hour to brush their teeth after consuming sports& energy drinks.  Otherwise, they will be spreading acid onto the tooth surfaces, increasing the erosive action.