15 interesting facts about teeth
- Teeth (singular tooth) are small, calcified, whitish structures found in the jaws (or mouths) of many vertebrates that are used to tear, scrape, and chew food.
- An adult human has 32 permanent teeth.
- You get 2 sets of teeth in your lifetime. The first set is your baby teeth. You will start to lose your baby teeth at around 6-7 years of age. By the time your 21 years old, you will only have permanent teeth.
- Dinosaur teeth come in a huge range of sizes and shapes–daggers, knives, shears, pegs, combs, rakes, filelike rasps, crushing batteries, and vices.
- Dentists have recommended that a toothbrush be kept at least six feet away from a toilet to avoid airborne particles resulting from the flush.
- Cats have 26 baby teeth and 30 permanent teeth.Dogs have 26 baby teeth and 42 permanent teeth.
- Before toothbrushes were invented people used twigs or their fingers to brush their teeth.
- 40% of people over 65 do not have all of their teeth.
- Teeth are not made of bone, but rather of tissues of varying density and hardness.
- In our life we produce about 10000 gallons of saliva and as we age the saliva secretions decreases making as more prone to dental diseases.
- Enamel is the hardest and most highly mineralized substance of the body and is one of the four major tissues which make up the tooth, along with dentin, cementum, and dental pulp.
- Dentin is the substance between enamel or cementum and the pulp chamber.
- Cementum is a specialized bony substance covering the root of a tooth. It is approximately 45% inorganic material (mainly hydroxyapatite), 33% organic material (mainly collagen) and 22% water.
- The dental pulp is the central part of the tooth filled with soft connective tissue.
- Some animals, particularly carnivores, also use teeth for hunting or defense.
