Scientists have come up with a new synthetic biomaterial that can make your visits to the dentist much more affable. The technology, developed by the University of Nottingham and the Wyss Institute at Harvard University, is composed of material that can stimulate, repair and regenerate various parts of your teeth.
Hence, experts have "crafted fillings that get the tooth's own stem cells to regenerate and repair tissue."
The composition of a tooth seems to like this new discovery. There is one enamel layer on the surface, below which there is another tissue called dentin. Under this is the pulp, which hosts the nerves and blood vessels.
Currently, the material that is used for the fillings is not compatible with pulp. However, the new biomaterials can stoke the tooth stem cells. Hence, it is possible to regrow pulp and dentin in the damaged areas.
In the in vitro testing, experts put in fillings that "stimulated the proliferation and differentiation of stem cells into dentin." This is the bony tissue composing the tooth under the white enamel. Experts feel that if the material is used to repair damaged teeth, the stem cells can repair any damage following a filling. Hence, the biomaterial filling would repair the tooth itself.
The news has been greeted with eagerness, as the root canal is the most dreaded news for anyone. "Damaged tooth, heal thyself! This would greatly reduce the number of fillings that eventually fail, and hence would reduce the number of root canals," exclaim the advocates. However, it will take its time to flow out from the lab to the strees.
This new technology bagged the second prize in the materials category of the Royal Society of Chemistry's Emerging Technologies Competition 2016.
