牙齿再生——梦想与现实

Tooth regeneration——dream to reality

牙齿及牙列缺失在临床上很常见,目前的修复方法均为非生物性的,尚不能满足人们的要求。实现真牙再生一直是一个梦想。牙齿再生分为全牙再生和部分牙齿再生,前者目前尚存在相当大的困难,但后者已有可喜进展,已在小鼠及大型动物小型猪上成功再生出生物牙根,有望成为全牙再生成功前良好的过渡。研究表明骨髓中部分细胞在一定条件下可以直接分化为成釉上皮样细胞及成牙本质细胞,有望成为牙齿再生的间充质来源的种子细胞。

Tooth or dentition missing compromises human health physically and psychiatrically. Although several prosthesis methods are used to restore tooth loss, these restorations are still non-biological methods. It is a dream for human being to regenerate a real tooth for hundreds years. There are two ways to regenerate the tooth. One is application of conventional tissue engineering techniques including seed cells and scaffold. The other is regeneration tooth using dental epithelium and dental mesenchymal cells based on the knowledge of tooth initiation and development. Marked progress has been achieved in these two ways, while there is still a long way to go. Recently a new concept has been proposed for regeneration of a biological tooth root based on tooth-related stem cells and tissue engineering technique. A biological tooth root has been regenerated in swine. It may be a valuable method for restoration of tooth loss before successful whole tooth regeneration. A latest research showed that a subpopulation in bone marrow cells can give rise to ameloblast-like cells when mixed with embryonic epithelium and reassociation with integrated mesenchyme, which may provide a new seed cell source for tooth regeneration.