03 Nov 2011 Developers confident chocolate toothpaste will be a hit
Have some chocolate each day to keep the dentist away? It seems to fly in the face of common sense: a cocoa extract that’s more effective at protecting teeth than fluoride? But that’s the truth behind a new toothpaste just launched in the US.
New Orleans scientist at Tulane University, Dr Arman Sadeghpour, has travelled a long journey to turn his doctoral thesis into commercial reality, creating a venture that’s being touted as the first major innovation in commercial toothpaste since manufacturers began adding fluoride in 1914.
Working on his PhD back in 2007, his goal was to find a natural compound to make teeth stronger, and he discovered a compound that could do that in an extract of the cocoa bean.
Sadeghpour led the Tulane University arm of the research team, which also included scientists from the University of New Orleans and Louisiana University’s School of Dentistry. They compared the cocoa extract versus fluoride, side-by-side on the enamel surface of human teeth.
The key to cocoa’s dental benefits is theobromine (the same substance that makes chocolate toxic for dogs), a water-insoluble, crystalline bitter powder that’s an alkaloid of the cacao plant. Its chemical makeup is similar to caffeine. Theobromine helps harden tooth enamel, making teeth less susceptible to decay.
Sadeghpour subsequently started up a biotech company, Theodent, and created a prototype of peppermint-flavoured toothpaste with the cavity-fighting cocoa extract that, after more than four years, countless tests, studies and FDA approvals, is about to hit the shelves.
Theodent toothpaste, packaged in a chocolaty brown tube (there is also an extra strength variant, Theodent 300) will be marketed directly to dental practices, be available on the internet and in Whole Foods Stores at the beginning of the year.
Sadeghpour believes that this extract from cocoa, now a proprietary blend known as Rennou, will actually replace fluoride as a key component in all toothpastes. “It’s definitely a replacement for fluoride, and ultimately that’s our goal,” he says, “We know that this technology is better than fluoride.”
But for now it’s about making Theodent stand out against the massive pharmaceutical companies that have dominated the market for decades. The company says it won’t compete with the big boys on a low cost price level, so it will focus on the science of stronger teeth – all coming from a natural product like chocolate.
In the meantime, Sadeghpour adds that consuming foods containing theobromine also boosts dental health. “Consumers do receive some benefit to all their bone tissue just from eating chocolate, thanks to the theobromine,” he says.
Chocolate candy doesn’t come close to matching the hoped-for benefits of Theodent, however. You get only about 3% theobromine even in high-quality dark chocolate, he explains, which is far outweighed by the tooth-decaying effects of sugar.
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