News from the School of Dental Medicine...
It's hard to keep track of all the progress we've been making in the research in all our departments and the impact we've been having on our community, but you'll find our attempt to collect it all here. To help fill in what we've missed, you may want to visit the university news center, which produces and hosts the Case Daily news reports. You can find older stories and more School of Dental Medicine publications in the news archive.
Donor Spotlight: Dr. Samuel C. Muslin
CWRU was his first choice in dental schools because of the incredible reputation that the school had earned in the California University textbooks back in the early 1970s. As a Californian, he had reservations about saying goodbye to the ocean to study in Cleveland, but the CWRU experience did not disappoint.
To learn more about Dr. Muslin's remarkable career, visit www.faceliftdentistry.com...
Leena Palomo awarded clinical research fellowship
The American Association for Dental Research (AADR) named Leena Palomo, assistant professor in the Department of Periodontics in the School of Dental Medicine, as the recipient of the 2012 AADR William B. Clark Fellowship in Clinical Research. This award, which recognizes investigators carrying out clinical research in periodontology, will be presented at the AADR Annual Meeting & Exhibition in Tampa, Florida on March 24. The fellowship was established in memory of William B. Clark and is supported by P&G Professional Oral Health, Crest Oral-B.
Palomo plans to collect subgingival biofilm and crevicular fluid samples from a population of otherwise healthy postmenopausal women diagnosed with periodontitis who are using bisphosphonate therapy for the prevention and treatment of osteoporosis and samples from demographically matched postmenopausal women who do not use such therapy. Microbial species and cytokine response between the two groups will be compared.
Dental researchers help unearth secrets of evolution
The words "fossil excavation" are likely to conjure up images of Indiana Jones-style adventurers wearing big hats and dusting off ancient remains with little brushes. Images of a dentist in the throes of such an endeavor might not readily come to mind, but perhaps they should, says dental researcher Mark Hans, DDS, who joined an excavation team in Israel this year to help shed light on how the human head has evolved over time.
In a prehistoric Israeli cave discovered in 2010, remains of human ancestors who lived between 30,000 and 20,000 years ago are being analyzed to help settle a dispute about the formation of the human chin--whether it became more prominent as our teeth recessed or if it is an entity that evolved on its own over time. Hans is making arrangements to have students join the dig and subsequent analysis in future years.
Common oral bacteria makes body vulnerable to illness
A common oral bacteria, Fusobacterium nucleatum, acts like a key that opens a door in human blood vessels and leads the way for it and other bacteria like Escherichia coli to invade the body through the blood and make people sick, according to dental researchers at Case Western Reserve University. Yiping Han, professor of periodontics at the Case Western Reserve School of Dental Medicine, made the discovery in her continued work with the Fusobacterium nucleatum bacterium, one of the most prevalent of the more than 700 bacteria in the mouth.
Han has studied the oral bacteria over the past decade and was the first to find direct evidence that linked it to preterm labor and fetal death. But its presence is found in other infections and abscesses in the brain, lungs, liver, spleen and joints.
Lose the fat and improve the gums, CWRU dental researchers find
Case Western Reserve University School of Dental Medicine researchers found that the human body is better at fighting gum disease when fat cells, which trigger inflammation, disappear.
The findings come from a pilot study of 31 obese people with gum disease. Half of the group with an average body mass index (BMI) of 39 had gastric bypass surgery and had fat cells from the abdomen removed. That half fared better than a control group of obese people with a BMI of 35 who also were treated for gum disease but did not have the gastric bypass surgery or fat removed.
All study participants underwent nonsurgical periodontal treatments of scaling/root planing and oral hygiene instructions for home care. While both groups showed improvement, the surgery group did even better on the measures for periodontal attachment, bleeding, probing depths and plaque levels.
Nabil Bissada, chair of the department of periodontics at Case Western Reserve School of Dental Medicine, is the lead author of the study, "Response to periodontal therapy in subjects who had weight loss following bariatric surgery and obese counterparts: a pilot study," published in the Journal of Periodontology. As the researchers look to further their research, their next step will be to conduct a longitudinal study to support their preliminary findings.
Mother Nature's Oral Antibiotics Research Gets $2.25 million from NIH
Research from Case Western Reserve University School of Dental Medicine to study an isolated agent from common oral bacteria may explain how human beta defensins (HBDs)--nature's way of keeping oral microbes from entering the body and wreaking havoc with our health--can be used to create new treatments to block bacteria from entering through epithelial linings.
Aaron Weinberg, professor and chair of the department of biological sciences at the Dental School, will lead the research group on a five-year, $2.25 million National Institutes of Health-funded project. The new grant, Weinberg said, will continue the exploration of their discovery last year of an agent called Fusobacterium nucleatum-associated Beta-Defensin Inducer (FAD-I).
The researchers are particularly interested in why FAD-I sets defensins to work without triggering inflammation, which can be a health risk if the inflammation is not abated by the normal defense system. In the mouth, it can cause gum disease and eventual tooth loss.
Read the full press release here...
CWRU School of Dental Medicine on WVIZ and WCPN
Case Western Reserve University School of Dental Medicine faculty and students participated in the multimedia production on oral health, Watch Your Mouth, from WVIZ and 90.3 WCPN. The documentary is part of Ideastream’s ongoing effort to bring public programming that can improve the health of its viewers and listeners in Northeast Ohio. Other programs have featured allergies, colon cancer and heart health. The production centers on the impact of oral health on physical health--a research focus of many dental school faculty.
Check out the film footage and more information here...