IGEM:MIT/2005/Program cells in the mouth to make a "minty fresh" smell

Somehow, if we can get mouth bacterial cells to take up R(-)carvones (spearamint) and excrete it shortly after encountering food (glucose?) <-- looks like a glucose-sensing-carvone-excreting experiment to me. Possible problem might be getting both enantiomers of the compound. Which would give us some gingergrassy smell. Mmm, better than bad breath, eh?

Methyl salicylate is probably easier to make. Check out this reference:

Negre F, Kolosova N, Knoll J, Kish CM, Dudareva N. Novel S-adenosyl-L-methionine:salicylic acid carboxyl methyltransferase, an enzyme responsible for biosynthesis of methyl salicylate and methyl benzoate, is not involved in floral scent production in snapdragon flowers. Arch Biochem Biophys. 2002 Oct 15;406(2):261-70.

This article captures the last stage of synthesis and expresses it in E. coli. Salicylic acid is supplied exogenously.

System: Flowery Breath
salivary amylase $$\rightarrow$$ bacteria $$\rightarrow$$ SAMT expression