Developmental plasticity of stem cells in tooth and taste bud renewal

We use the continuously replacing dentition of Lake Malawi cichlid fishes to understand de-novo tooth replacement in adult vertebrates. In this system, each tooth is replaced in a one-for-one fashion every ~50 days. Here, we explore the source of epithelial stem cells for tooth replacement. Transcriptomes of replacement teeth and taste buds were obtained from Labeotropheus feulleborni and Metraclima zebra. Three replicates per species per tissue were collected.