Stem Cells and Teeth
Stem Cells and Teeth
Two Asian newspapers are reporting that researchers in Japan at Osaka University and National Institute of Advanced Industrial Science and Technology’s Research Institute for Cell Engineering used stem cells derived from the germ of human wisdom teeth to repair damaged liver and bones in rats. The story was originally published in the Japanese paper the Daily Yomiuri and reprinted with slight variations on the Chinese site Xinhua. The article reports that the tooth germ can be changed into bone, liver, or nerve cells by stimulating it with hormones, and that the stem cells grow far more quickly than those taken from bone marrow.
There is no indication of what journal published the research, and I was unable to find any evidence of recent publication on this subject at the website for the Research Institute for Cell Engineering. I reported in December on using tooth stem cells to repair teeth, and in November on research with stem cell derivation from the pulp of baby teeth that was done over two years ago.
I have some skepticism about this, not so much on scientific grounds as on questions of credibility. Generating nerves from teeth germ would be a phenomenal accomplishment, but I by no means discount the possibility—after all, our teeth have nerves and are fairly complicated little structures. But I’m not willing to accept this as true without seeing a more detailed account of the study and evidence that it’s been peer-reviewed in some way. It’s quite possible it has—I just haven’t found it yet, so I report on it with this caveat.