Towards a novel toothpaste: the effect of gum Arabic-silver nanoparticles on the oral biofilm

Abstract

Background: Oral health is an integral part of overall health and wellbeing of a human being. Over 3 billion people worldwide suffer from poor oral health or dental disease. Oral disease may cause discomfort, pain, disfigurement, tooth loss and loss of function. Untreated oral disease may lead to decreased work productivity in adults, loss of school days for children, economic burden to families, and reduced quality of life. Oral disease includes a range of chronic clinical conditions such as dental caries, periodontal disease and oral cancer. The most prevalent disease in the world is dental caries, which is becoming more prevalent, especially in countries with low and moderate incomes. Caries has a strong microbial association. Hence, measures of microbial control of microorganisms need to be included in continued research on caries prevention. Multidrug resistant microbes against existing antibiotic drugs is a challenge in health care, including dentistry. The development and evaluation of new technologies is essential to overcome these problems. Nanotechnology has emerged as an important innovation assisting in the provision of health care. When compared to bulk molecules, nanoparticles (NPs) have powerful physical properties. They are solid nanometer-sized particles (100 molecules in size). Recently, interest in the use of nanotechnology has increased in dentistry as cutting-edge techniques for preventing and treating dental caries as well as regulating oral biofilms. It has been established that silver nanoparticles (AgNPs) have the potential to be used to create new antibacterial agents, drug delivery systems, biomaterials, and regeneration materials, in addition to their wide scope of medical applications. The synthesis of AgNPs can either be from inorganic or organic sources. The biosynthesis of AgNPs from organic sources such as plant extract is preferable due to their accessibility, renewability, biocompatibility, environment-benign nature, and cost effectiveness. Consequently, the author investigated the use of gum Arabic (GA) plant extract to synthesize AgNPs because of its ubiquity on the African continent, its sustainability and its known medicinal value.