has been demonstrated certainly in animal models, it is not practical as a public health measure. It is like saying the maximum speed of a jet plane is the speed of light. It just is not practical to try and evolve on to that point. And so in smooth surface caries, we have a more practical goal in working on the microorganism.  (emphasis added)
Similar to the approaches the sugar industry was promoting, Greulich identified interventions targeting bacteria as promising to the NIDR (Table 3, column B), including dextranases, for which the NIDR had been working with the pharmaceutical company Merck Sharpe & Dohme to think through the steps necessary for practical application . The NIDR was also hopeful about a laboratory finding on “low molecular weight dextrans,” another substance that might be delivered to keep bacteria from producing harmful acid when exposed to sugar .
Beyond its focus on decay-causing bacteria, Greulich told ISRF that the NIDR was investigating ways to modify sugar to reduce its harmful effects . These dietary modification interventions included adding phosphates to sugar, and the possibility of replacing table sugar, in the form of sucrose, with a liquid sugar, that split the sucrose molecules into glucose and fructose, which were thought to be less harmful to teeth . Just before concluding, Greulich again assured ISRF that the NIDR research was not a threat to sugar consumption: “I reiterate that the role of sucrose [in dental caries] is undeniable, yet there is very little that anyone would want to do about this other than to explore some of these possible [dietary] modifications” .
Industry convenes a panel that includes many members of the NIDR Caries Task Force.
In October 1969, the NIDR Caries Task Force Steering Committee met to identify research priorities . As Greulich predicted, the main approaches reviewed focused on interfering with bacteria and dietary modification of sugar (Table 3, column C) . However, a summary of the Caries Task Force Steering Committee meeting indicates that they “also reviewed the agenda for a conference on the role of human foodstuffs in dental caries” . Caries Task Force Steering Committee member Basil Bibby would participate in the conference organization , and would have the chance to discuss the state of research on models identifying the cariogenicity of foods with the Caries Task Force, but not until March 1970 .
In October 1969, the same month the Caries Task Force Steering Committee was evaluating research priorities to eradicate dental caries (Table 1) [31,71], ISRF President Ross convened his Panel Meeting of the Dental Caries Task Force to consult on ISRF’s dental caries research priorities . As Table 2 illustrates, the membership of ISRF’s panel overlapped almost completely with the NIDR Caries Task Force Steering Committee. All members of the NIDR Caries Task Force Steering Committee sat on the ISRF expert panel, with the exception of Fitzgerald, whose research on S. mutans had identified sucrose as the worst offender in smooth surface cavities [31,53]. The significant overlap between the membership of the ISRF expert panel and that of the NIDR Caries Task Force Steering Committee gave ISRF direct access to the NIDR’s Caries Task Force Steering Committee.
ISRF’s summary of the ISRF Panel Meeting of the Dental Caries Task Force indicates that the ISRF panel “recommended that a study be made of the cariogenicity of carbohydrate-containing foodstuffs” but did not mention studying the tooth-decay-causing potential of foods in its final “major approaches to caries”  (Table 3, column D).
Industry submits recommendations to the NIDR.
ISRF submitted the findings from its series of meetings to the NIDR Caries Task Force late in 1969 in a report titled Dental Caries Research—1969 . While recognizing the causative role of sugar in tooth decay, ISRF downplayed the feasibility of restricting consumption of sugars while promoting advances made in areas of dextranase and caries vaccine research . It also summarized dental caries interventions that would reduce the ha