Foam improvement: Swetha Sivakumar on the history of toothpaste

The quest for minty-fresh breath goes back at least 5,000 years.

PREMIUM The Dentist (1629), a satirical painting by Dutch artist Jan Miense Molenaer. In pre-industrialised Europe, there was no anaesthetic yet, and treatment was largely limited to gouging and tugging extractions performed by medicine men. (Wikimedia)

Around 3000 BCE, Ancient Egyptians equated beauty and health with a good set of teeth. They mixed ground-up oxen hooves, pumice and water to make what was likely the world’s first toothpaste. (Dentists still use a form of pumice to polish tooth enamel.)

Across the ancient world, other cultures devised their own methods. Indians used dantakastha or teeth-cleaning twigs from the neem, babul or mango tree (many Indians still do). The Chinese used a powder made primarily of fish bones. The Ancient Greeks and Romans used a mix of crushed-up bones and oyster shell.

In pre-industrialised Europe, homemade toothpaste from the neighbourhood apothecary was one of the few things considered a staple. It’s worth remembering that there was no anaesthetic yet, and dentistry was non-existent (except for the gouging and tugging extractions performed by local medicine men).

Even so, most Europeans didn’t brush daily; only once in a while, before festivals, social visits, or if pain indicated a problem. The science wasn’t yet know; the habit hadn’t formed. But crucially, such products as soaps and toothpastes were expensive, and were treated as luxuries.

Industrialisation finally made things like brushes and chemicals cheaper.

A major change came about in 1892, when the American dentist Dr Washington Sheffield reinvented the packaging. He came up with the toothpaste tube, inspired by how paint was packaged and sold.

Until then, as hard as this is to believe now, family members all dipped their toothbrushes into the same communal jar.

By 1896, Colgate (which started out in 1806 as a soap and candle business and had been selling toothpaste in jars since 1873) had made the switch to tubes. And the race began to find the best formula.

Today, the average toothpaste contains abrasives, humectants, thickeners, surfactants and flavouring agents. The abrasives, typically silica or calcium carbonate, do the hard work of scrubbing away plaque and stains. They make up about a third of the paste’s weight. Detergents such as sodium lauryl sulphate create foam and loosen debris. Binders derived from cellulose or seaweed keep the paste uniform, while humectants such as glycerol and sorbitol prevent it from drying out.

Preservatives such as benzoates keep bacteria from growing inside the tube. Fluoride helps strengthen enamel and prevents cavities. Some modern formulations add antibacterial agents to fight gum disease or pyrophosphates to reduce the build-up of tartar.

In terms of innovation, a rather clever one occurred in 1955, when the innovator Leonard Marraffino of New York invented striped toothpaste, through the simple mechanism of layering the colours within the tube.

In a recent video, TikToker Ryan Battistella mashes and twists a Colgate tube repeatedly, yet the stripes remain intact. Colgate’s research team explained that it all boils down to viscosity.

Manufacturers typically use thickeners such as xantham gum or cellulose gum to make toothpaste a lot thicker than it looks. So thick in fact that, unless one slices the tube open and mixes the gel manually, each layer will remain precisely separated.

As for the taste, everyone has their favourite kind, depending on preferred minty-ness, consistency and foam.

One thing most pastes have in common: sodium lauryl sulphate, the foaming agent. It has a little something to do with taste too. This chemical temporarily suppresses sweetness receptors and breaks down protective lipids on the tongue, letting bitterness dominate. This is why orange juice tastes so acrid, if sipped in the first few minutes after you brush. Wait a while and the effect abates. How the tongue recovers like this, through the marvel of the tastebuds is, well, a story for another day.

(To reach Swetha Sivakumar with questions or feedback, email upgrademyfood@gmail.com. The views expressed are personal)