DT News - UK - Tooth replacement in puffer fish may advance dental therapies

Dental Tribune International

Fri. 18 May 2012

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SHEFFIELD, UK: According to British scientists, the dentition of puffer fish could provide a new model for understanding the genetic processes underlying the mechanism of continuous tooth replacement. With further research, they hope to identify the gene network responsible for the maintenance system, which is lost in humans after the second set of teeth.

For the first time, researchers from the University of Sheffield’s Department of Animal and Plant Sciences have analysed the development of the dentition of the puffer fish and found that its unique dental structure is modified by a distinctive developmental genetic bauplan.

Puffer fish belong to the Tetraodontiformes family, which characteristically possess four teeth, two in the upper jaws and two in the lower jaws. These teeth form paired opposing beak-shaped tooth-plates and are constantly renewed throughout the creature’s life, the researchers found.

“The beak structure is made from many bands of dentine, stacked together. Each band represents a new replacement tooth, and they can have more than seven separate bands making up the beak, with new bands continuously being formed to replace those damaged by eating,” said Dr Gareth Fraser, expert in the evolution and development of the jaws and teeth in fishes, and lecturer in the department.

Owing to stem cells controlling tooth growth in the jaw, the teeth in humans are replaced only once. With regard to the recent findings, the researchers can now use the puffer fish as a model for lifelong tooth replacement to understand how humans lost their replacement potential and to determine the key genetic regulators of dental stem cell maintenance.

“Furthermore we aim to channel research toward fully understanding the mechanism and genetics of tooth replacement that may lead to novel dental therapies, which could be used to invigorate or revive the dormant tooth replacement genetic tool-kit in humans,” Fraser added.

The article was published online on 7 May in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Science journal ahead of print.

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