Understanding How Bacteria Arrange Themselves in Your Mouth
Official title: Spatial Organization of the Oral Microbiome
Funded at Ada Forsyth Institute, INC. · NIH-11160762 · Data updated 2026-11-12
This project explores how the arrangement of bacteria in your mouth impacts your overall health, especially your blood pressure.
Quick facts
| Grant type | R01 grant |
|---|---|
| Study type | NIH-funded research |
| Funding institution | Ada Forsyth Institute, INC. NIH-funded |
| Lab location | 1 site (Somerville, UNITED STATES) |
| Project start | September 3, 2012 |
| Project end | August 31, 2028 |
| Funding year | 2025 |
| Award (this year) | $732,837 |
| NIH project number | 5R01DE022586-14 |
| Project ID | NIH-11160762 on NIH RePORTER |
Who could benefit from this research
✓Could help
Ideal candidates would be healthy volunteers interested in participating in dietary studies related to oral bacteria and blood pressure.
✕Less likely to help
Patients seeking immediate treatment for specific conditions may not receive direct benefit from this foundational research.
What this research studies
The bacteria living in your mouth play a big role in both your oral health and your general well-being. This project aims to understand how these tiny communities of bacteria are organized and how their arrangement affects your health at a very small level. Researchers use advanced imaging tools to map out where different bacteria live in your mouth. They are also exploring how what you eat, specifically nitrates, can change these bacterial communities on your tongue. This helps us learn more about how these bacterial arrangements might influence important body functions, such as blood pressure.
Why it matters
Potential benefit: If successful, this work could lead to new ways to manage blood pressure and improve overall health by understanding and influencing the bacteria in your mouth.
How similar studies have gone: This project builds on previous successful work that developed new imaging techniques to map oral bacteria, now applying them to understand how their arrangement affects health.
Where this research is happening
-
Ada Forsyth Institute, INC.
Somerville, United States Active
Researchers
- Principal investigator: Mark Welch, Jessica Leigh — Ada Forsyth Institute, INC.
- Study coordinator: Mark Welch, Jessica Leigh
Related research
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Spatial Organization of the Oral Microbiome
A research project at a leading medical institute studies how the tiny mouth bacteria are arranged in the tongue and teeth and how this arrangement affects mouth and overall health.
About this research
- This is an active NIH-funded research project — typically early-stage science, not a clinical trial accepting patient enrollment.
- Some NIH-funded labs run parallel clinical studies or seek volunteers for related work. To check, contact the principal investigator or institution listed above.
- For full project details, budget, and progress reports, visit the official NIH RePORTER page.