Expanding the foundation for personalized medicine: implications and challenges for dentistry.

Personalized medicine aims to individualize care based on a person's unique genetic, environmental, and clinical profile. Dentists and physicians have long recognized variations between and among patients, and have customized care based on each individual's health history, environment, and behavior. However, the sequencing of the human genome in 2003 and breakthroughs in regenerative medicine, imaging, and computer science redefined "personalized medicine" as clinical care that takes advantage of new molecular tools to facilitate highly precise health care based on an individual's unique genomic and molecular characteristics. Major investments in science bring a new urgency toward realizing the promise of personalized medicine; yet, many challenges stand in the way. In this article, we present an overview of the opportunities and challenges that influence the oral health community's full participation in personalized medicine. We highlight selected research advances that are solidifying the foundation of personalized oral health care, elaborate on their impact on dentistry, and explore obstacles toward their adoption into practice. It is our view that now is the time for oral health professionals, educators, students, researchers, and patients to engage fully in preparations for the arrival of personalized medicine as a means to provide quality, customized, and effective oral health care for all.

Behavioral effects of long-term exposure to magnetic fields in rats.

Male rats and pregnant and nonpregnant female rats of the Wistar strain were sham-exposed or exposed to static (0.49 T) or to extremely low frequency (50 Hz) magnetic fields (0.018 T) 2 h per day for 20 consecutive days. Measures of irritability, exploratory activity, and locomotion were made in that order before and after the 4th, 10th, and 17th 2-h exposures. A reliable decrease in the irritability of rats after repeated exposure to a static or undulating field was found. No significant effects of treatment conditions on open-field behavior and locomotor activity were observed. Pregnancy had no influence on the behavioral end points. These results indicate that irritability of rats may be used as a simple behavioral indicant of mammalian sensitivity to magnetic fields.