For the first time, Oak Ridge National Laboratory scientists have cultivated an oral microbe present in adults with periodontitis, an advanced gum disease that affects nearly half of all adults in the world.
The microbe, Desulfobulbus oralis, can help scientists better understand how the microbes that form a community within people's mouths interact with each other.
The D. Oralis bacteria is present in the oral cavity, and present more with diseases like periodontitis. But the microbe is not very abundant and is more difficult to get to than other microbes present with the disease because it is anaerobic.
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