Battle of the bugs blamed for bad breath

11:34 19 February 03

NewScientist.com news service

People who suffer from bad breath could lack a set of "good" bacteria that bind preferentially to their tongues and keep foul-smelling micro-organisms at bay. The new research suggests mouths could be kept fresh with the use of pro- rather than anti-bacterial mouthwash.

Bruce Paster and colleagues from the Forsyth Institute in Boston, Massachusetts used a gene-sequencing technique to identify the bacteria living on people's tongues.

They found that those suffering from halitosis tend to lack the three bacterial strains most common in sweet-smelling mouths and instead harbour a host of previously unknown bugs.

"This is the first application of the concept of good and bad bacteria to halitosis," says Jeffrey Hillman at the University of Florida. Hillman recently created a strain of genetically modified, "good" bacteria to help combat tooth decay by killing off acid-producing strains.

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