High School Students grow bone from tooth stem cells

15/01/2016

Three high school students have used stem cells from teeth to grown bone, and in doing so won $30,000 in the Siemens Maths, Science and Technology competition.

The students used the stem cells which had been extracted from wisdom teeth and a 3-D printer to help grown new bone. The 3-D printer was used to create a type of scaffold which was used to help stimulate the cells on it and to grow the new bone. The students demonstrated that they could produce clusters of cells which could then develop into new bone.

One of the students, Alan Tan, said ‘we thought it would be cool to take something that is normally thrown away, such as teeth, and recycle it’

The team are interested in medicine as a whole and wanted tom ake an impact on other people’s lives.

To find out more about generating new bone visit the BioEden website or to read the students success story visit CIRM California’s Stem Cell Agency.