Research could lead to ability to grow new dental tissue
Researchers have found cells that are likely to responsible for the formation of human dental tissue and are now proposing to apply the study this further with a view to growing new dental tissue for patients.
The team of histologists and dentists from School of Biomedicine, Far Eastern Federal University (FEFU), teamed up with Russian and Japanese colleagues and used human prenatal tissues to study the early stage of development of the embryonic oral cavity during the period when the teeth were set up – from the 5th to the 6th week.
They recognised several types of cells that are involved in the formation of one of the teeth rudiments including chromophobe cells with elongated spindle-shaped form, which are responsible for the development of human teeth in the first weeks of embryo formation.
The scientist noted that large chromophobe cells reside not only the place where the teeth of the embryo form, but also exist at the border where the multilayers squamous epithelium of the oral cavity passes into the cylindrical epithelium of the developing digestive tube. This means that the new bio-engineering approach is relevant not only for growing new dental tissue but also for growing organs for subsequent transplantation and likely will be applied in gastroenterology.
