Journal of Oral Tissue Engineering

MINI REVIEW
Regeneration of Epithelium and Nerve Fibers Incident to Implantation
- Neuronal Similarity between Peri-Implant and Junctional Epithelium -


Noritaka FUJII1,2, Katsumi UOSHIMA2, Takeyasu MAEDA1,3

1Division of Oral Anatomy, Department of Oral Biological Science,
Niigata University Graduate School of Medical and Dental Sciences
2General Dentistry and Clinical Education Unit, Niigata University,
Medical and Dental Hospital
3Center for Transdisciplinary Research, Niigata University

Review:J Oral Tissue Engin 2005;2(2): 51-59

Full Text. DOI https://doi.org/10.11223/jarde.2.51

This review highlights the regeneration of gingival oral epithelium and neural ele-ments incident to dental implantation. The regeneration process of nerve fibers can be divided into the three following stages; 1) an epithelial healing stage; 2) a com-pletion stage of epithelial regeneration; and 3) a stage of osseointegration estab-lishment. Prior to gradient disappearance of inflammatory reaction around the epi-thelium, the nerve fibers begin to regenerate in the healing peri-implant epithelium. After completion of epithelial healing, the peri-implant epithelium exhibits the same neural density and terminal morphology as the intact junctional epithelium. These regenerated nerve fibers show a beaded-in-appearance, suggesting that these fibers contain neuropeptides including calcitonin gene-related peptide and substance P which have diverse functions. These findings indicate that the peri-implant epithe-lium share some structural and functional features with normal junctional epithelium, although these two epithelia have different origins.
Key words: dental implant, nerve regeneration, peri-implant tissue, junctional epithelium