Types of Human Teeth: Sets, Function, Structure
There are 2 sides to every story and the story of human teeth also has 2 sets of dentitions: the deciduous & the permanent! This story is actually no big mystery. Humans grow two sets of teeth, a deciduous set (milk teeth, baby teeth) of 20 primary teeth (10 on the top and 10 on the bottom) and a permanent set of 32 permanent adult teeth, 16 on each upper and lower jaw. Why humans have a deciduous set of teeth is refreshingly simple. Unlike other body parts, teeth do not change in size once fully developed. Since a full set of 32 adult-size permanent teeth are simply too big to be held in a baby’s jaw, these have to be preceded by the initial deciduous set. As the human jaw grows older and jaws begin to grow, one will observe gaps between the milk teeth which are filled up when replaced with the larger permanent teeth to give one the even appearance of an adult dentition. As the ‘baby’ teeth are replaced by the adult teeth in the larger adult jaws, essentially they are mainta...