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multipotent mesenchymal stem cells from bone marrow are expected to be a somatic stem cell source for the development of new cell-based therapy in regenerative medicines. however, dental clinicians are unlikely to carry out autologous cell/tissue collection from patients (i.e. marrow aspiration) as a routine procedure i their clinics; hence, the utilization of bone marrow stem cells seems impractical in the dental field. dental tissues harvested from extracted human teeth are well known to contain highly proliferative and multipotent stem cell compartments and are considered to be an alternative autologous cell source in cell-based medicine. this article provides a short overview of the ongoing studies for the potential application of dental stem cells and suggests the utilization of 2 concepts in future regenerative medicine: (1) dental stem cell-based therapy for hepatic and other systematic disease and (2) tooth replacement therapy using the bio engineered human whole tooth, called the "test-tube dental implant." regenerative therapies will bring new insight and benefits to the fields of clinical medicine and dentistry |
