In Oregon, a new option for people getting root canals may be available thanks to Oregon Health and Science University researchers and National Institutes of Health funding. Taking recent developments from 3D printing, researchers found a way to create blood vessels in a lab that were placed in the root canal of extracted human teeth. Amazingly, after seven days, the cells near the tooth walls and the artificially made blood vessels flourished inside the teeth, showing that decaying teeth can come back from the dead.
Lead researcher on the project and assistant professor of restorative dentistry in the OHSU School of Dentistry and assistant professor of biomedical engineering in the OHSU School of Medicine, Luiz Bertassoni, D.D.S., Ph.D., told Controlled Environments, “This result proves that fabrication of artificial blood vessels can be a highly effective strategy for fully regenerating the function of teeth. We believe that this finding may change the way that root canal treatments are done in the future.”