Is your Mouth okay to kiss?

Whether you’re about to kiss your girlfriend or begin a job interview, you need to know whether your breath is sweet and clean.

Tel Aviv University (TAU) researchers have come up with a tiny breath test which lets you know whether malodorous bacteria are swarming all over your mouth. A blue result suggests you need a toothbrush. But if it’s clear, you’re “okay to kiss”.

The ‘OkayToKiss device’ comprises a colour indicator and saliva collector.

Scientists believed that only one population of bacteria (the gram-negative ones) break down the proteins in the mouth and produce foul odour.

But Mel Rosenberg, of TAU’s Faculty of Medicine, recently discovered that gram-positive population of bacteria are bad breath’s bacterial partner.

These bacteria appear to help the gram-negative ones by producing enzymes that chop sugary bits off the proteins that make them more easily degraded. This enzymatic activity, present in saliva, serves as the basis for the new test.

“All a user has to do is dab a little bit of saliva onto a small window of the ‘OkayToKiss’ kit,” explained Rosenberg.

“‘OkayToKiss’ will turn blue if a person has enzymes in the mouth produced by the gram-positive bacteria. The
presence of these enzymes means that the mouth is busily producing bacteria that foster nasty breath,” he said.

Apart from its social uses, the test can be used as an indicator of a person’s oral hygiene, encouraging better health habits, such as flossing, brushing the teeth, or scheduling that long-delayed visit to the dentist, said a TAU release.