Radiant plasma may combat cavities

Here’s a new way to flash a smile: Waft a glowing plasma of charged particles onto your teeth. Researchers in the Netherlands and the United States have shown that a radiant vapor made from electrically zapped helium gas quickly kills colonies of the main bacterial culprit in tooth decay.

DEAD ON. Glowing plasma, depicted in the intensity-enhanced video image (top), killed and blackened a patch of tooth-cavity-causing Streptococcus mutans bacteria (bottom photo).