Canadian Scientists Regrow Teeth

54mc writes "APL reports that Canadian Scientists have created the first device able to regrow teeth and bones. The researchers at the University of Alberta in Edmonton filed patents earlier this month in the United States for the tool based on low-intensity pulsed ultrasound technology after testing it on a dozen dental patients in Canada."

Comments

So how exactly does it work?

[nietsch]

"with low frequency ultrasound pulses" is pretty uninformative for me. If they can regrow theeth, do they first have to implant a 'seed' that will focus the growth? Every theeth has a quite specific form, how will this device influence that?

Or can it be that somebody patented a possible way to stimulate bone & tooth growth and some reporter let his fantasy run wild on it?

Re:Inevitable Discovery

[lowrydr310]

I don't understand why people always associate Hockey with missing teeth. For the past 30 years or so goalies have been wearing face shields, nearly eliminating their chances of getting teeth knocked out.

Players who aren't goalies still don't wear face shields in 2006, however most facial injuries from hockey involve someone getting hit with the end of a stick or getting crushed into the boards by a bad hit, NOT getting hit with a puck (though it does happen sometimes).

Root canal?

[paulhar]

> Chen helped create the tiny ultrasound machine that gently massages gums and stimulates tooth growth from the root once inserted into a person's mouth, mounted on braces or a removable plastic crown.

As several of my teeth have gone the way of the fairy, I wonder how this "treatment" copes with teeth that have been root canal filled.

And what colour does the new tooth grow back at? It it's pure white - fantastic as it'll put lots of whiting products out of business, but bad as it'll have the pringles effect; once you start you'll have to have all your front/visible teeth done, even if they are just discoloured.

Re:Root canal?

[milletre]

>I wonder how this "treatment" copes with teeth that have been root canal filled.

Saw this on the news last night - they said that it will repair root canals.

About the only thing it won't do is regrow a tooth that's been removed - it needs cells to start with.

Sounds pie-in-the-sky at the moment to me. It may be that there is some viable periodontal ligament around necrotic teeth, but there's simply no living tooth-producing tissue in them (odontoblasts). Odontoblasts are found at the pulp-dentin border, which is pretty much removed during cleaning and shaping of the canal space. What they're saying, then, is that they can either bring cells back from the dead (odontoblasts not filed away during root canal therapy), or, using ultrasound only, induce random connective tissue or bone cells into not only reverting to an earlier cell type, but then having it turn into an odontoblast, and then having that odontoblast lay down dentin not on in the quantity they want, but in the direction they want.

Not bloody likely. I can tell you from experience that teeth with root canals are different animals when it comes to resstoration, fracture susceptibility, extraction, etc.

Medical research is too slow

[MichaelSmith]

From TFA:

With the help of Chen and Ying Tsui, another engineering professor, the initial massive handheld device was shrunk to fit inside a person's mouth.

But they had something like this working in the late 1990s so for part of the last seven years they have been mucking around making a minature version of their machine. A proper engineering job would have taken six months, max, and they could have kept working on the science.

Sorry to bitch about this but I see too much improvisation going on and not enough forethought.

What about bones illness?

[KarMax]

This is amazing... i never imagine that this could be possible.

It can also stimulate jawbone growth to fix a person's crooked smile and may eventually allow people to grow taller by stimulating bone growth, Chen said.

I'm far away to know something about odontology, so i ask to the slashdot doctors:
This stimulation process could be used to cure bone illness, like Osteoporosis or Osteosarcoma ??

Thanks in advance.

Re:What about bones illness?

[Zzootnik]

Actually, I was more thinking of Using this on Space Travelers to stave off the Bone Density Loss that inevitably (??) occurrs... Sounds like One of the big problems solved...MMmmmmmm... Full Body Ultrasound....

Or- yeah...I suppose you could also use it to treat/cure degenerative bone loss symptoms. No reason it can't have multiple applications...Except maybe Patent law.

Re:Presence of stump?

[Red Flayer]

There needs to be a root. Interesting that you bring up the research into teeth grown from stem cells[1], possibly one could create the root from stem cells, implant, and then finish the growth with this device. I'm not sure if tissue rejection would be a problem, though.

There's also a good potential for this to be used for body modification. Easy enough to add things to the diet to impart a color into the tooth while it grows (one reason why kids aren't given tetracycline -- it makes their growing teeth permanaently orange). A mouthful of glow-in-the-dark teeth? No problem. How about teeth that glow orange or green under a blacklight, instead of violet?

Dr. McCoy would be jealous!

[Anonymous Coward]

What's next? All I can say is WOW, I've lost s few teeth from gum disease.

It isn't nearly as impressive as the technological miracle I've experienced the last 2 days.

I wore glasses since age 7 (yes I'm a nerd). I switched to contacts 4 years ago, and had to have reading glasses as well as contacts. I used to be four-eyes, now that I'm old it's six eyes.

Then I got a cataract in my left eye. The specialist told me of a new implant that was only approved in 2003, and extra $1900 above what insurance pays. As it's a one shot deal (they can't remove an implanted artificial lens) I went temporarily broke on it.

Dr. McCoy would have been jealous of all the technology in the operating room.

In the recovery room I could read the clock on the wall without any external corrective lenses for the first time in memory (I've worn glasses since 1959). The next day (yesterday) the eye doctor tested my eye, 20-20. For the first time in my life I have no restrictions on my driver's license!

Last week I had the type on the browser enlarged, plus wore reading glasses. Today I have the type set for normal, and no reading glasses. They tell me in a month I'll be able to read six point type w/o reading glasses!

In Star Trek II, McCoy gives Kirk a pair of antique reading glasses because he's allergic to the drug that cures age related nearsightedness.

We're still 200 years from the 23rd century, but we've passed Star Trek tech. Even McCoy didn't have these implants at his disposal! The implant I got, called a Crystal Lens, cures nearsightedness, farsightedness (both age-related and youth myopia), cataracts, and even astigmatism!

I'll get the other eye done in a few years. Then maybe I'll get some Canadian teeth!

(anti-MRC="botched". Couldn't be more wrong!)

Dental technology

[foniksonik]

I've complained before and will again, that dentistry has been the most underwhelming of 'sciences' for the past 100 years. What advances have we seen since the use of anaesthetics to reduce the pain? We got ultra-violet whitening systems.... and veneers.

So finally there's some progress. First was the company in florida which has since sort of gone into hiding... they showed a solution of genetically engineered oral bacteria that would take over control of the mouth by out-competing the native breed.. but were engineered to not create cavities. Haven't heard much on that front recently though. Maybe they got bought up by the makers of Crest or something...

Now we have a device that can regrow eroded tooth material... well it's something at least.

Maybe I can stop thinking of the whole practice of drilling and gouging and filling in with metals as the most barbaric so-called treatments of any human health problem. Dentistry is still at the equivalent stage of just cutting off the leg when it's broken, rather than fixing it. Hopefully that is about to change.

Re:Inevitable Discovery

[Lord Ender]

Not even the audience is safe in hockey. I was at an NHL game in Columbus a couple years back where a puck hit a girl in the audience. But it didn't just break teeth, it killed her. The players aren't the only ones who get hurt by pucks.

Re:Inevitable Discovery

[cellocgw]

AFAIK where I come from, players are required to have face shields. It seems it's still not mandated in the NHL..

It's worse than that. The NHL bans full face shields (with exceptions for players recovering from broken cheekbones,jawbones, etc). It's an incredibly stupid rule.