• FaceDeer@fedia.io
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    5 months ago

    Important to note that the initial form of this treatment is to trigger the growth of teeth that failed to grow in the first place, at least last I read about it. An important first step, but for now it may be dependent on there being an existing “tooth bud” down in the jaw to get going.

    I suspect that in the long run we’ll need to figure out how to implant a new tooth bud, probably made using the patient’s stem cells, to grow replacements for teeth that have been lost later in life.

    • cowfodder@lemmy.world
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      5 months ago

      Doing this from memory, but I think there was a paper a few years back proposing using stem cells in an implanted calcium lattice. Basically an artificial implant that would grow into an actual rooted tooth.

    • Foreigner@lemmy.world
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      5 months ago

      Would this work for microdontia? I have two front teeth that failed to grow to the proper size and one of them has a very small root, meaning a crown is not an option and I don’t want to get implants.

      • FaceDeer@fedia.io
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        5 months ago

        No idea, I’m just repeating caveats I’ve seen raised on this particular news before.