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Photo by Patrick Whittemore

Dr. David Matzilevich inspects a human tooth at New England Cryogenics, which stores teeth for stem-cell research.

 

A handful of parents in Massachusetts and around the globe are taking out a biological insurance policy of sorts for their kids by freezing cells from their baby teeth in the hope that the cells could someday help their offspring overcome disease and organ failure - or simply live longer.

One Newton lab is so convinced that dental-pulp preservation will become a nationwide trend, it recently started accepting baby teeth from around the country and as far away as Turkey.

“I see dental pulp emerging for a range of disorders down the road and I see this within our lifetime,” said Dr. David Matzilevich, chief scientific officer at New England Cryogenic Center Inc., which started officially banking stem cells from dental pulp two months ago. “That’s a message that should be given to parents.”

The center, one of a handful of companies that are banking dental pulp, has teeth from 65 kids, but expects that number to take off.

For now, the science is very new.

It’s only been a few years since a California scientist discovered that the soft, pink tissue inside a baby tooth contains a gold mine of stem cells that could someday be used to grow bones, heart tissue and treat neurological diseases.

Scientists, doctors and dentists are pinning hopes on dental-pulp stem cells because the research is promising, the need for stem cells is out there and these stem cells carry no controversy, unlike embryonic stem cells.

“Custom bone growth, teeth regeneration and growing heart cells for replacement therapy,” Matzilevich said, listing off the potential future uses. “And that’s just the beginning. We’re not there yet, but we’re getting there.”

New England Cryogenic Center already stores umbilical cord blood cells, sperm and research tissue samples in dozens of 500-gallon vats that are filled with liquid nitrogen and kept at subzero temperatures. When lab technicians open the giant drums, vapor spills out like white smoke. It may sound futuristic, but it’s a matter of years before science catches up with the increasing supply of private stem-cell banks.

“I think the applications for these cells are really widespread,” said Pam Yelick, director the division of Craniofacial and Molecular Genetics at Tufts University. “It’s very exciting. You can use them to form nerves and muscle and bone and blood because they are really a mixture of cell types. In that respect, dental pulp is very valuable.”

Yelick’s research has focused both on tooth regeneration as well as ways to transform dental pulp stem cells into cells that can become other kinds of tissue.

Bioeden, a Texas company, has been processing and storing children’s dental-pulp stem cells for more than a year. The supply seems almost endless, but the concept is new, said Bioeden president Jeff Johnson. “There’s a lot of kids running around out there with teeth in their head,” he said.

The option to bank dental pulp gives parents who did not preserve their newborn’s umbilical cord blood, another rich source of stem cells, one more shot at protecting the future, he said.

“It’s not invasive. It’s not expensive,” said Johnson, whose company is storing dental-pulp stem cells from about 2,000 children.

Dr. Ken Brady, a Needham dentist who keeps New England Cryogenic’s baby-teeth kits on hand in his office, said the idea is still so new that many dentists aren’t aware of it.

“I’d call it cutting edge for sure,” Brady said. “Right now, it’s certainly hope and promise.”

By The Numbers: Stem cells and baby teeth

75: Average weight in milligrams of a baby tooth.

15: Average number of stem cells extracted from the dental pulp inside a baby tooth.

Millions: Potential number of cells produced from one stem cell.

Minus 300: Temperature in degrees Fahrenheit at which stem cells extracted from baby teeth are stored.

Zero: Temperature in degrees Fahrenheit of an average household refrigerator freezer.

20: Average number of baby teeth per child.

11,265: Number of children born in the United States each day.

65: Number of clients who sent at least one of their children’s baby teeth to New England Cryogenic Center in 2007.

$120: Dollars per year to store and maintain dental-pulp stem cells with New England Cryogenic Center, plus a one-time $795 fee.