Launched in October, the FaceBase Consortium brought together eleven grantee institutions to generate orofacial data from animal and human models and make it available to all craniofacial researchers. Curated by the University of Southern California, FaceBase contains genetic information involved in common developmental diseases like cleft lip and palate.

Temporomandibular (TMD) Disorders were little understood when NIDCR began funding "Orofacial Pain: Prospective Evaluation and Risk Assessment," the first ever longitudinal study of a chronic pain condition. OPPERA established that TMD was much more than a localized dental/jaw disorder and that women were more likely than men to progress from an acute to a chronic condition. Read the initial results here.

NIDCR funded expansion of the Dental Practice-Based Research Network, developed by the University of Alabama, Brimingham, to enable dentists and hygienists to conduct clinical studies of immediate practical value. To date the National Dental PBRN has enrolled more than 62,000 patients nationwide and has drawn practitioners more closely to NIDCR. Learn the history of the PBRN here.

Dental immunologist Dennis Mangan suspected the relation between persistent microbes and pathogens and human health. In 2002, while an NIDCR grants officer, Mangan founded the multi-institute Microbial Biofilms Research Program. After new technology made study of the entire microbiome feasible, Mangan became the first director of the NIH Human Microbiome Project, launched in 2007.

Prepared by NIDCR in collaboration with the Office of the Surgeon General, Oral Health in America demonstrated that oral health is integral to general health. The report also stated that despite the availability of safe and effective means for maintaining oral health, poor oral health continued to disproportionately affect vulnerable populations.

From the beginning, Institute leaders sought to extend the NIDR beyond dentistry and had long sponsored craniofacial research of all types. To commemorate its 50^th Anniversary, director Harold Slavkin, with help from the American Dental Association, persuaded Congress to rename the institute the National Institute of Dental and Craniofacial Research (NIDCR), effective October 21. View an interview with Dr. Slavkin here.

Harold Slavkin became director in 1995, stepping up research in oral cancer, genetics, craniofacial defects, promoting tissue engineering, and expanding the centers program. Slavkin fostered new institutional partnerships, coordinating with dental practitioners and patient advocacy groups, leading NIH efforts to diversify the workforce, and pushing to rename NIDR the National Institute of Dental and Craniofacial Research (NIDCR). He retired in 2000.

In September, NIDR launched its Regional Research Centers for Minority Oral Health Initiative. Intended to strengthen minority representation in the field, the regional centers were partnerships between minority programs and larger research-intensive institutions. The NIDR minority research centers were the first created by an NIH institute and the model for subsequent efforts.