In the group of Tohoku University Graduate School of Dentistry (Professor Satoshi Fukumoto) and Kyushu University Graduate School of Dentistry (Assistant Professor Keigo Yoshizaki), a substance called "nephronectin" plays an important role in the mechanism by which rodent teeth such as mice continue to grow. It was clarified that it is responsible for.
Even if the anterior teeth of rodents are scraped, they will continue to grow for the rest of their lives.This is because stem cells (cells that can become teeth in the future) exist at the root of the tooth, and these cells can supply cells that continuously form enamel, but the mechanism has not been clarified so far.
Both groups found that nephronectin, an extracellular matrix, is strongly expressed in epithelial cells during tooth development and is an important factor in the differentiation of stem cells into "teeth". I found it.With this result, it is expected that by regulating the expression of nephronectin, it will be possible to regulate a large amount of epithelial stem cells required for tooth regeneration and to induce them into enamel-forming cells.
Human teeth cannot be restored once they are broken or cavities, so current dental treatments require reliance on dentures and implants for lost teeth.However, in this study, the factors that proliferate and differentiate the stem cells that are the basis of teeth have been elucidated, and it is expected that a technology that will make human teeth reproducible in the future will be developed.
Paper information: [Scientific Reports] Nephronectin plays critical roles in Sox2 expression and proliferation in dental
Epithelial stem cells via EGF-like repeat domains.
