Believe it or not, our teeth are made up from different tissue types and not all teeth are the same , but they all play a pivotal part in our day-to-day lives. For example, some teeth are sharp and serrated, whilst others are wide and blunt.
Today we wanted to look at the different types of tooth and what they are made of.
Right at the front of our mouth we have Incisors; these are sharp teeth that we use to tear food as we bite down. You will have 8 incisors, divided up into 4 at the top and 4 at the bottom. These teeth play an important role in being able to break-up and cut into the food we eat.
The second set of teeth you will come to next to these in what we call the Canines. These are you sharp pointed “Dracula” styled teeth. We have one of these each side on the upper set of teeth. These are again used to help tear food.
Next in line as we move backwards into the mouth are the Premolars – these are the grinders and the ones that once food has been tore up, further breaks the food down enough to swallow comfortably. There are 4 of these, 2 top and 2 at the bottom.
Sitting next to the premolars are your Molars and there are quite a few of these present towards the back of your mouth and they are usually broken down into sets. So the 1st set and 2nd set are made up of teeth that help to grind food down even further. These sets are made up of pointed, sharp and grooved teeth.
The final set, known as the 3rd set are made up of your Wisdom Teeth which you may have heard of before as they are often the set that need taking out if your mouth becomes overcrowded with teeth. There are 12 Molars in total, bringing the total amount of teeth to 32.
Now we have discussed how many teeth you have and the different typed of teeth that are found inside your mouth, let’s look at what makes a tooth.
A tooth is made up of 4 main tissue types, the Pulp, Dentin, Enamel and the Cementum layer.
Let’s start firstly with the Pulp which actually occupies two areas of the tooth, the Pulp Chamberwhich sits in the crown of the tooth and the Root Canal which sits in root. The pulp is the main section that occupies the inside of a tooth made from nerves and blood vessels that enter via the root canal and travel up to the chamber. It is important to keep the pulp healthy and free from infection as it is this part of the tooth that helps keep it nourished. Infection could mean the loss of your tooth.
The next is a hard substance known as Dentin, which is essentially the protective armour around the Pulp. The Dentin is like bone and is yellowish in colour – it makes up most of the tooth and defends the inside from infection.
Even harder than Dentin is Enamel which then covers the Dentin layer – Enamel is hugely important as it takes the brunt of most of the action a tooth goes through, such as chewing, temperature changes and so forth.
Finally, a layer that perhaps we don’t hear about as much is the bone like tissue that holds the tooth into the jawbone. Cementum. This layer sits under the gum line and covers the outside of the root, much like “cement” holding everything in place.
And there you have it! The different types of teeth, and the parts that make up a tooth.
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