When flesh and bone crumble into oblivion, teeth stubbornly persist. Their enamel, the hardest tissue in the body, often outlasts everything else, turning each molar into a tiny time capsule. In this roundup, we’ll explore 10 secrets locked within these stubborn artifacts, revealing diets, diseases, fires, and even ancient medicines that have shaped our ancestors’ lives.

From the high‑carb cravings of Paleolithic hunters to the smoky lungs of fire‑using cavemen, each set of chompers tells a story louder than any written record. Grab your dental floss of curiosity and let’s pull apart these fascinating findings, one tooth at a time.

10 Secrets Locked: Unveiling Dental Mysteries

10. The Real Paleo Diet

The modern Paleo craze touts a low‑carb, high‑protein lifestyle, but ancient teeth from Morocco’s Grotte des Pigeons tell a different tale. Researchers found that these Paleolithic peoples were actually indulging in sweet acorns, loading up on carbs well before agriculture ever took root.

Analysis of the dentition shows that over half of the individuals bore cavities—a striking 50‑plus percent—leaving only three specimens untouched by decay. This overturns the long‑standing belief that tooth decay only became prevalent after the advent of farming around 10,000 years ago.

While the Grotte des Pigeons population might represent an outlier, earlier surveys of pre‑agricultural societies reported dental disease rates ranging from zero to 14 percent. Intriguingly, more than 90 percent of the remains are missing their front incisors, hinting that they may have been intentionally removed during ritual practices.

9. Mystery Ape Of The Ur‑Rhine

In 2017, scientists from Mainz’s Museum of Natural History announced a jaw‑dropping find: a hominid tooth dating back 9.7 million years, potentially upending the classic out‑of‑Africa narrative.

The fossil emerged from the ancient Rhine riverbed and belongs to an Australopithecus-like creature reminiscent of “Lucy.” The site, dubbed “Ur‑Rhine,” has become a fossil hotspot, yielding 25 new species over the past decade and a half.

So far, researchers have unearthed two teeth—a left upper canine and a left upper molar—from a sediment layer that stretches back ten million years. The first of these appeared in September 2016, but the team held back on publishing until a year later to verify the astonishing implications.

If confirmed, these teeth suggest that hominid relatives were roaming Europe far earlier than previously thought, predating similar African species by about four million years.

8. Secrets Of The Gunk

Earlier this year, a comparative study of dental calculus from Belgium’s Spy Cave and Spain’s El Sidron site shed fresh light on Neanderthal lifestyles. The Belgian specimens revealed a meat‑heavy diet, packed with wild sheep and woolly rhinoceros.

Conversely, the Spanish teeth painted a picture of a forest‑dwelling Neanderthal community thriving on mushrooms, pine nuts, and moss—an entirely plant‑based menu.

Researchers observed that these dietary shifts mirrored changes in the microbial communities inhabiting the dental plaque. One Spanish individual even displayed signs of self‑medication for a painful abscess, along with traces of the parasite Microsporidia.

Further analysis uncovered poplar bark—an ancient source of aspirin—and the presence of the mold Penicillium in the calculus, suggesting that this Neanderthal may have deliberately consumed rotting, mold‑laden vegetation to harness natural antibiotics, a precursor to modern penicillin.

7. Prehistoric Pollution

In 2015, a team of researchers uncovered what may be the earliest evidence of anthropogenic pollution preserved in 400,000‑year‑old dental plaque. The fossils came from Israel’s Qesem Cave, where tartar deposits contained tell‑tale traces of respiratory irritants, most notably charcoal particles from indoor hearths.

Qesem Cave is among the first sites that demonstrates regular fire use. Charred soil clumps, burnt bones, and a 300,000‑year‑old hearth all point to a long‑standing relationship between these early humans and controlled combustion.

While the consensus holds that fire was first harnessed roughly a million years ago, the exact timeline for routine cooking remains hazy. The Qesem evidence pushes the regular use of fire back at least 300,000 years.

Unfortunately, the very technology that improved nutrition also introduced a health cost: the teeth showed wear and damage consistent with chronic smoke inhalation, a stark reminder that progress can come with unintended side effects.

6. Hobbit Teeth

Discovered in 2003, the remains of an 18,000‑year‑old diminutive hominin from Indonesia’s Flores island have long intrigued scientists. Dubbed “hobbits,” these tiny bodies sparked debate: were they deformed modern humans or a distinct species, Homo floresiensis?

In 2015, a comparative dental analysis showed that the hobbit’s teeth most closely resembled those of Homo erectus, suggesting an evolutionary link between the two.

Islands often drive extreme dwarfism; on Flores, the ancestors of the hobbits—likely a population of H. erectus—shrank dramatically. Between 95,000 and 17,000 years ago, average stature fell from roughly 165 cm (5 ft 5 in) to just 110 cm (3 ft 7 in), while brain volume dropped from about 860 cc to 426 cc.

These pint‑sized hominins survived well into the era of modern humans, potentially representing the last non‑human hominin species before disappearing, much like the dodo.

5. The Chompers Of Chaucer’s Children

In 2016, a team employed three‑dimensional microscopic imaging on the teeth of 44 children, aged one to eight, interred at St. Gregory’s Priory and Cemetery in Canterbury. These youngsters lived between the 11th and 16th centuries.

The analysis revealed that most children were weaned around their first birthday. Their early diet consisted of simple fare: pap, a thin porridge, and a broth‑like bread soup known as panada.

Notably, fruits and vegetables were largely absent from their meals. While the diet was bland, the lack of refined sugars meant these medieval kids suffered far less tooth decay than today’s children.

An unexpected discovery: socioeconomic status did not influence the children’s diets. Unlike adults, where wealth dictated food variety, poor and wealthy youngsters ate essentially the same meals.

4. Prehuman Dentistry

In 2015, researchers examined teeth unearthed a century ago from Croatia’s Krapina site, uncovering evidence of dental care dating back 130,000 years. Several teeth—including a premolar and a third molar—displayed deliberate modifications.

These modifications featured grooves, enamel fractures, and scratches consistent with the use of a primitive tooth‑pick crafted from bone or grass. The uneven wear, especially on the tongue side, suggests the manipulations occurred while the individual was still alive.

The findings dovetail with other Krapina artifacts, such as ornamental eagle talons, challenging the outdated view of Neanderthals as brutish and lacking symbolic behavior.

Today, we recognize that Neanderthals responded to dental pain and aesthetic concerns much like modern humans, using tools to alleviate discomfort and perhaps even for decorative purposes.

3. Daoxian Teeth

In 2015, a team of paleoanthropologists uncovered a collection of 47 modern‑human teeth deep within China’s Fuyan Cave in Dao County. Radiometric dating places these teeth at a minimum of 80,000 years old—well before the widely accepted out‑of‑Africa migration window.

The cave also housed remains of several other species, including an extinct giant panda. No stone tools were found, leading researchers to hypothesize that a predator may have dragged the human remains into the cave.

Because the teeth were too ancient for conventional carbon dating, scientists turned to calcite deposits surrounding the fossils to estimate their age. This method pushed the timeline of human presence in East Asia back by roughly 20,000 years.

These discoveries challenge the prevailing out‑of‑Africa model, which posits that Homo sapiens spread from Africa between 50,000 and 70,000 years ago, suggesting instead that multiple waves of migration—or earlier dispersals—may have occurred.

2. Pompeii’s Lovely Teeth

In 2015, researchers harnessed CT scanning technology to peer inside the plaster casts of victims from the AD 79 eruption of Mount Vesuvius. The scans revealed that the Pompeian populace boasted remarkably healthy teeth despite the era’s lack of formal dental care.

Archaeologist Giuseppe Fiorelli originally pioneered the practice of casting the bodies in 1886, allowing for the safe transport of remains without further degradation.

Until the advent of modern imaging, only the external features of these casts were accessible, leaving the internal dental health hidden for nearly two millennia.

The CT scans uncovered that the victims’ diets were rich in fibrous vegetables and fruits, and the volcanic environment may have supplied elevated levels of fluorine in both air and water—factors that together contributed to their excellent dental condition.

1. Mediterranean Missing Link

In 2017, researchers from Germany’s University of Tübingen announced a startling find: a potential human‑chimpanzee common ancestor uncovered not in Africa, but in the Mediterranean. Dated to 7.2 million years ago, the specimen—named Graecopithecus freybergi—was recovered from sites in Greece and Bulgaria.

The discovery rests on a single tooth and a lower jawbone, both of which predate comparable fossils from the East African “cradle of humanity” by several hundred thousand years.

What makes this tooth especially intriguing is the morphology of its roots. While typical great‑ape teeth possess two to three diverging roots, Graecopithecus exhibits convergent, fused roots—a characteristic shared with early hominins and modern humans.

These findings suggest that the split between the lineages leading to humans and chimpanzees may have occurred in the Mediterranean rather than Africa, possibly driven by shifting climates that created expansive grasslands in Europe and spurred bipedal adaptations.

A leading authority on occult music, Geordie McElroy hunts spell songs and incantations for the Smithsonian and private collectors. Dubbed “the Indiana Jones of ethnomusicology” by TimeOut, he also fronts the Los Angeles‑based band Blackwater Jukebox.

Welcome to a wild ride through 10 weird facts about teeth that most people never learn in school. We brush, we floss, we maybe even brag about our pearly whites, but the hidden history and bizarre science behind our chompers is anything but ordinary. Grab your toothbrush, maybe a sip of water, and get ready to explore the truly fascinating (and occasionally gross) world of dental oddities.

10 Bejeweled Teeth

The ancient Maya, famed for their calendar and dramatic prophecies, also possessed a surprisingly sophisticated dental aesthetic. Around 2,500 years ago they didn’t just settle for clean teeth—they turned them into sparkling works of art. Skilled practitioners used primitive drills to carve, shape, and even embed gemstones into the enamel, creating dazzling displays that went far beyond mere whitening.

Male members of Maya society, in particular, would have tiny perforations made in their teeth to house glittering stones, turning their smiles into status symbols. Archaeologists believe the precision required to set these jewels without fracturing the tooth demonstrates a remarkable level of dental craftsmanship.

9 Perez The Mouse

While many cultures rely on the whimsical Tooth Fairy, Spanish‑speaking nations have a different nocturnal visitor: Ratoncito Pérez, or Perez the Mouse. The legend began in 1894 when the young son of Spain’s king lost his first tooth. The monarch commissioned priest Luis Coloma to write a tale that introduced a mouse who trades lost teeth for small gifts.

The story caught on like wildfire and remains beloved across Hispanic communities. Traditions vary—Argentinian children, for instance, place their lost tooth in a glass of water for the thirsty mouse, while other regions refer to him as the “magic mouse” rather than simply Pérez.

8 Street Dentistry

Before the modern era of licensed dental professionals, tooth troubles were handled by the most readily available hands with the right tools. In the early 1800s, a formal dental profession barely existed, and people only sought help when a tooth ached badly, often resulting in extractions.

Blacksmiths and barbers, equipped with pliers and rudimentary drills, filled the gap, performing everything from pulling teeth to rudimentary fillings. As dentistry evolved into a regulated field, these “street dentists” were pushed out, and today you’ll never see a village blacksmith pulling a molar.

7 Synthetically Grown Teeth

Chinese researchers have been experimenting with growing teeth in the lab using stem cells, but acquiring those cells proved tricky. Their unconventional solution? Harvesting stem cells from human urine—a method that raises eyebrows but offers a non‑invasive source.

The team implanted the harvested cells into the mouths of mice, observing the formation of dental pulp and early enamel layers. While promising, experts caution that urine‑derived cells carry contamination risks, and even if lab‑grown teeth mature, integrating them safely into a human mouth remains a formidable challenge.

6 Toothache Remedies

When a tooth throbs, desperation can spark bizarre cures. Ancient peoples, lacking modern analgesics, turned to folklore and oddball tactics that were more placebo than prescription.

One belief held that tiny worms lived inside aching teeth, prompting remedies involving seeds and wax to coax them out. Another involved chanting incantations while swapping saliva with a frog—hardly a pleasant notion. A particularly grim method suggested driving a nail into the inflamed area, then hammering it into a wooden beam, with the claim that the tooth would never bother its owner again.

5 Germ Encrusted Toothbrush

The urban legend that flushing a toilet can spray germs onto a nearby toothbrush has led many to keep their brush far from the bathroom throne. While the notion sounds terrifying, research shows the toilet itself is relatively clean compared to the brush.

Because a toothbrush constantly contacts oral bacteria, it becomes a breeding ground for microbes—especially when left damp. The real culprit isn’t airborne splash from the toilet, but moisture that lets bacteria thrive on the bristles. Keeping the brush dry after use is the most effective way to curb microbial growth.

4 Love Your Teeth Day

China faces a massive public‑health challenge: ensuring its 1.35 billion citizens maintain decent oral health. Dental neglect, driven by fear, cost, and delayed symptoms, can lead to infections that threaten overall health.

To combat this, the Chinese government instituted September 20 as “Love Your Teeth Day.” The annual campaign features promotional events, free check‑ups, and educational outreach, encouraging citizens to visit dentists and adopt preventative habits. Over the years, the initiative has noticeably increased dental clinic attendance nationwide.

3 Mountain Dew And Appalachian Teeth

In the remote Appalachian valleys of the United States, poverty and isolation have birthed a unique dental crisis. Residents often favor Mountain Dew—a sugary, caffeinated soda—over water, leading to rampant tooth decay dubbed “Mountain Dew Mouth.”

Attempts to curb the problem, such as prohibiting soda purchases with food‑stamp benefits, have met resistance, as addiction drives people to find alternative ways to obtain the beverage. Some suggest the region could benefit from its own “Love Your Teeth Day” to raise awareness.

2 The First Brushes And Toothpaste

Long before electric toothbrushes, humanity experimented with oral hygiene using natural tools. Ancient Egyptians employed twigs to scrub their teeth, a practice still alive today in many cultures that favor antibacterial sticks like cinnamon or neem, which are as effective as modern brushes.

The first brush resembling today’s design emerged in China: a bamboo handle bristled with boar hair. Early toothpaste, however, was far from minty fresh—recipes mixed ash, burnt eggshells, crushed bone, and other gritty ingredients to scour away plaque.

1 Proper Dental Hygiene

Many assume the best time to brush is immediately after a meal, when food debris is most visible. Yet this is also when saliva acidity peaks, and vigorous brushing can erode enamel. Dentists recommend rinsing with water post‑meal to neutralize pH, then waiting about thirty minutes before brushing.

Even flawless brushing falls short without flossing. The thin filament reaches inter‑proximal spaces brushes miss, preventing gum disease and decay. As one dentist quipped, “Only the teeth you want to keep get flossed.” Follow dental pros on social media for more tips.

Forensic science has leapt forward dramatically over the past two centuries. What began as rumor‑laden accusations and shaky testimony has blossomed into a sophisticated web of DNA profiling, video surveillance, data mining, and the hard‑core physical sciences. One branch of the latter— forensic dentistry—has repeatedly proven its worth. Although bite‑mark analysis has fallen out of favor in many jurisdictions and sparked heated debate, other dental techniques such as DNA fingerprinting from teeth, age estimation, and post‑mortem identification remain indispensable. In this top 10 criminal roundup, we’ll see how human teeth have either cracked cases wide open or, occasionally, led investigators down a misleading path.

Why the Top 10 Criminal Cases Matter

10 Aggrippina and Lollia Paulina’s Golden Teeth

The saga of Lollia Paulina is often cited as the earliest recorded instance of forensic dentistry being used to identify a corpse. Some even argue it marks the birth of forensic science itself. Either way, her golden dental work played a starring role in solving the mystery.

In a power struggle for the Roman throne, Agrippina the Younger coveted Emperor Claudius and saw Lollia Paulina as a rival. After winning Claudius’s hand, Agrippina moved swiftly: she accused Lollia of sorcery, secured a conviction, stripped her of property, exiled her, and ultimately ordered her to take her own life. When a guard presented Agrippina with Lollia’s severed head as proof, the facial features were distorted beyond recognition by death, dismemberment, and the journey home. To confirm the identity, Agrippina turned to the only unmistakable clue—Lollia’s famously gilded teeth. By opening the skull’s jaw and spotting the gold‑filled dental work, she verified that the head was indeed her rival’s, marking what is believed to be the first forensic dental identification.

9 Reverend George Burroughs

The 1692 Salem Witch Trials remain a grim chapter in early American jurisprudence, and they also feature a bizarre forensic episode involving a bite mark. Among the many innocent victims of the hysteria was Reverend George Burroughs, who was accused of consorting with the devil.

One of the accusations hinged on a bite imprint allegedly left on a young victim’s arm. Investigators compared the mark visually to Burroughs’s teeth, and that superficial match was enough to seal his fate: he was convicted and hanged. Decades later, historians exonerated him, but his case stands as the first instance in the United States where bite evidence was presented as a key piece of proof.

8 Jesse Timmendequas and Megan’s Law

Today, every U.S. state enforces Megan’s Law, a set of statutes that make sex offender details—names, photos, addresses—publicly accessible. The law’s origins trace back to a tragic 1994 case involving a young girl named Megan Kanka.

Megan was brutally raped and murdered by her neighbor, Jesse Timmendequas. While a myriad of evidence led to his conviction, one striking piece was a bite mark Megan managed to leave on Timmendequas’s hand as she fought back. That dental imprint helped seal his guilt, and the case ultimately spurred the nationwide push for the child‑protection legislation we now know as Megan’s Law.

7 Thomas Maupin’s Dentures

In the spring of 2001, a woman walking alone on a deserted stretch of road near Memphis, Tennessee, was violently attacked. She survived a stabbing and rape, reported the crime, and investigators collected a trove of forensic evidence at the scene.

Despite the wealth of material, the perpetrator remained at large—until a decade later. Among the evidence was a set of dentures that had been overlooked initially. When the case was reopened, forensic analysts examined the dentures and discovered a handwritten name inside them, linking them directly to the attacker. That revelation led police to Thomas Maupin, who was subsequently arrested and convicted for the assault.

6 Fredrik Fasting Torgersen

The Norwegian case of Fredrik Fasting Torgersen remains a cautionary tale about the perils of over‑reliance on bite‑mark testimony. In 1958, Torgersen was charged with the rape and murder of a young girl, despite a glaring lack of physical evidence linking him to the crime scene.

During the trial, a self‑styled expert witness asserted that a bite mark found on the victim’s breast “with full certainty pointed to Torgersen as the murderer.” This claim became the cornerstone of the prosecution’s case, even though no other corroborating evidence existed.

Over the ensuing decades, the bite‑mark evidence has been heavily scrutinized and widely criticized as scientifically unsound. After serving 16 years of a life sentence, Torgersen was released, and the case continues to spark debate about the reliability of forensic odontology in criminal justice.

5 Bundy’s Big Bite

Ted Bundy, the charismatic yet murderous serial killer, confessed to the deaths of 30 women during the 1970s and admitted to numerous additional kidnappings and rapes. His cunning allowed him to evade capture for years, leaving scant physical evidence behind.

One of the few tangible clues emerged during an attack on a sorority house, where a victim sustained a deep bite on her left buttock. Forensic odontologists Richard Souviron and Lowell Levine created dental casts of Bundy’s teeth and matched them to the imprint, providing a critical link that helped secure his conviction and ultimately end his reign of terror.

4 Sharon Carr’s Cheetos Teeth

In early 2001, a frantic 911 call reported an intruder inside a home where a mother was alone with her two children. The intruder lingered before fleeing through an open window, leaving behind a water bottle and an empty bag of Cheetos.

Police arrived to find the house empty but noted the discarded items. While canvassing the area, officers discovered the intruder, Sharon Carr, hiding in nearby bushes. The breakthrough came when they observed a fine layer of Cheetos dust coating her teeth, a distinctive clue that confirmed her presence at the scene.

This seemingly minor piece of evidence—Cheetos residue on a suspect’s teeth—demonstrates how even the most unconventional forensic clues can clinch a case.

3 Ray Krone Overturned

In 1992, Ray Krone was convicted of murder and labeled the “Snaggletooth Killer,” largely on the strength of bite‑mark analysis that supposedly linked his dental pattern to injuries on the victim’s body.

Like the Norwegian case, Krone’s conviction rested on tenuous bite evidence. However, DNA testing later exonerated him, identifying the true perpetrator, Kenneth Phillips, a repeat sexual offender. Since his release, Krone has worked with the Innocence Project, advocating against the death penalty and highlighting the necessity of DNA evidence to correct wrongful convictions.

2 John Wayne Gacy

John Wayne Gacy, infamously known as the “Killer Clown,” murdered at least 33 young men, many of whom were sexually assaulted and tortured. The discovery of his victims proved a monumental forensic challenge.

Police unearthed 26 bodies from the crawlspace beneath Gacy’s home. Dental records were instrumental in identifying 23 of those victims. In the years since, additional victims have been recovered from the Des Plaines River, with many identified through dental DNA analysis, underscoring the enduring value of forensic dentistry in resolving cold cases.

1 Josef Mengele Identified

Josef Mengele, the notorious “Angel of Death,” conducted horrific medical experiments on Auschwitz prisoners. After World War II, he evaded justice, fleeing to Argentina, then Paraguay, and finally Brazil, assuming multiple identities.

In 1979, while swimming, Mengele suffered a stroke and drowned. His body was recovered under an assumed name, and for decades his fate remained a mystery. It wasn’t until Brazilian and American dentists compared post‑mortem skull X‑rays with those taken years earlier by a Brazilian dentist who had treated Mengele that a definitive identification was made.

American dental scientist Lowell J. Levine declared that the remains could now be identified as Josef Mengele “with absolute certainty.” Thus, the final piece of forensic evidence—teeth—closed the chapter on one of history’s most infamous war criminals.

Professional fighters, newborn babies, and the supporting cast of Deliverance aside, pretty much everyone has a mouthful of teeth. We use our ivories on a daily basis, mashing up food and smiling at friends, but we often take our thirty-two teeth for granted. And that’s just too bad. As it turns out, the human tooth is incredibly strange and is surrounded by weird and wild facts like…

10. Actors’ Teeth

There are quite a few actors out there who lose or gain a few pounds for a role, but that’s nothing compared to the stars who attack their teeth. For the 1999 classic Fight Club, Brad Pitt knew he needed to radically alter his appearance to play anarchist Tyler Durden. After all, if you start up an underground boxing club, you probably won’t end up with a movie star a beautiful smile. Pitt paid a dentist to chip away at his chompers, giving Durden a much edgier look.

But you don’t need to be an A-lister to go all method on your mouth. For his role as Stu Price in The Hangover, comedian Ed Helms also made a quick trip to the dentist. If you’ve seen the film, you know Stu pulls out his own tooth on a bet. Of course, the actor wasn’t willing to go quite that far in real life. But Helms was a man literally born to play the part of Stu. Helms was born missing a tooth, and at the age of fifteen he filled the gap with an implant. When it came time to star in The Hangover he simply removed the fake. The process was probably a bit painful, as it involved unscrewing the implant and screwing a plug into the gap in his gum. Talk about dedication.

However, the award for hardcore dentistry has to go to Viggo Mortensen. While filming Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers, Mortensen was busy bashing orcs at the Battle of Helm’s Deep when things got out of hand, and Aragorn accidentally broke his tooth. But instead of stomping off to his trailer, Mortensen wanted to keep  filming and insisted that someone glue his tooth back on. Fortunately, director Peter Jackson decided to cut and sent Viggo off to receive proper medical treatment. Still, you have to admire the man’s work ethic.

9. The Norwegian Tooth Bank

There are all kinds of bizarre biological banks, from sperm banks to blood banks to banks full of eyeballs. But in Norway scientists are busy working on an even stranger special facility just for storing milk teeth.

Also known as deciduous teeth, milk teeth are the extras we lose as children, and researchers from the Norwegian Mother and Child Cohort Study (MoBa) hope parents will donate these little incisors and bicuspids to their ever-growing tooth bank. Scientists are currently working with 100,000 children in the hopes of building the largest tooth bank in the world.

But why would anyone want milk teeth in the first place? It turns out that these temporary teeth are excellent indicators of what pollutants are in the environment. By studying them, along with blood and urine samples from the parents, MoBa researchers can learn how environmental contaminants affect a child and mother’s health. As of 2013 the bank had 17,000 teeth, all kept in envelopes and locked away in the University of Bergen where no tooth fairy can ever find them.

8. Teeth Tattoos

They might sound like something out of a sci-fi novel, but teeth tattoos are actually quite popular these days. Applied to a cap or crown, these images are permanent and come in all shapes and sizes, from pictures of George Washington to sail boats to phrases like “Bite Me.”

Scientists at Princeton and Tufts are taking teeth tattoos in a completely different direction. Instead of ink, they’re using graphene, and it isn’t for art’s sake. These tattoos are actually electronic sensors, and they’re a bacterium’s worst nightmare. Imprinted on silk, the tattoos are placed onto a tooth, and after water washes the silk away the graphene remains and monitors the mouth for bacteria. Powered by electrodes and an inductive coil, the tattoo uses antimicrobial peptides to latch onto germs. Thanks to the electricity in a bacterium’s cell membrane, a signal is sent to a nearby antenna which scientists use to determine what kind of bacteria is crawling around inside your mouth. You still need to brush, though.

7. The Fake Braces of Asia

In the west, most people think of braces as geeky, ugly and kind of uncomfortable. But beauty is relative, and in Asian countries like Thailand, Indonesia and Malaysia, braces are considered super cool… and super illegal, thanks to the rich kids.

In cities like Bangkok braces can run up to $1,200, which is a little expensive for most Thai kids. But like everything else owned by the rich and powerful, braces suddenly have an air of wealth and status about them. That’s where fashion braces, or kawat gigi untuk gaya, come in. Running about $100, these braces are sold in markets, beauty salons, and online, and can be customized in all sorts of styles like Mickey Mouse and Hello Kitty.

You don’t even need a dentist to wear fashion braces. Do-It-Yourself kits are extremely popular, despite the fact that they’re against the law in Thailand. In 2012, two teenagers developed deadly infections thanks to fashion braces. Authorities were also worried about the amount of lead found in the wires and were concerned kids might choke on loose pieces. Wanting to prevent any further deaths, the Thai government outlawed the practice, threatening to punish producers with up to six months behind bars. But that only gave rise to a thriving black market for braces.

6. Buddha’s Teeth

When most people think about relics, they generally picture Christian artifacts like the Holy Grail, the True Cross and the Shroud of Turin. But Buddhism has its share of holy objects as well — many are from the Buddha’s own body, including quite a few plucked out of his mouth.

If you ever visit Sri Lanka be sure to drop by the city of Kandy, where you’ll find the sage’s left canine on display in the Temple of the Tooth. After the Buddha’s cremation, the tooth became a symbol of power. Whoever owned the canine had the right to rule Sri Lanka, and it was passed down from monarch to monarch. As you might expect, quite a few people squabbled over the tooth, and holy men were forced to hide it from time to time until it finally ended up in Kandy for all the world to see.

On your next trip you can stop by the Buddha Tooth Relic Temple and Museum in Singapore, where you can admire another one of the philosopher’s pearly whites surrounded by prayer rooms and ornate dragons. However, the weirdest of all the Buddha’s teeth is without a doubt the one in Rosemead, California. Worshippers claim the two-inch molar is actually still growing and even possesses miraculous healing powers.

5. John Lennon’s Tooth

Michael Zuk isn’t your average dentist. This Canadian has filled plenty of cavities, but when he isn’t pulling teeth Zuk is busy working on an odd experiment that involves John Lennon’s tooth. How did a dentist from Alberta get his hands on one of Lennon’s pearly whites? In the 1960s, John gave his rotten molar to his housekeeper, a woman named Dot Jartlett. He thought it would be a nice gift for her Beatlemaniac daughter, and the tooth stayed in the Jartlett family until 2011 when they sold it for over $30,000.

The buyer was Michael Zuk, and he had some very weird plans. He’s used the tooth to draw attention to mouth cancer and even let his sister use a fragment for her sculpture of Lennon’s head. However, his ultimate goal is to clone the rock star. Zuk has allegedly teamed up with a group of scientists who’ve begun sequencing Lennon’s DNA. If all goes according to plan, the singer will make his big comeback in 2040. Only this time Zuk will make sure Lennon stays away from “drugs and cigarettes.”

4. The Incredibly Creepy Jesus Statue

Visit any Catholic church and you’re bound to spot an icon of Jesus or the Virgin Mary. Most of these statues are made out of wood or plastic, but if you take a little trip to San Bartolo Cautlalpan, a small town outside Mexico City, you’ll find a figurine that’s a little more lifelike than the rest.

In early 2014 experts from Mexico’s National Institute of Anthropology and History were restoring an icon of Christ known as “The Lord of Patience.” This 3’8” wooden statue depicts Jesus moments before his crucifixion, sitting down and staring into the sky. Dating back to the 18^th century, this statue was scheduled to undergo restoration, but when researchers started X-raying the piece they noticed something extremely odd about its teeth — they had roots.

Upon closer examination, the researchers found that the Lord of Patience was fully equipped with eight human teeth, and judging by the size they were probably removed from a healthy adult. But why would anyone put real teeth inside a wooden statue? Well, perhaps it was a way of scoring points for the afterlife. Back in the day, believers would offer up hair clippings to make wigs for icons. Researchers believe that a faithful churchgoer probably yanked out a few spare ivories as a way of proving his or her devotion to God. That brings a whole new level to the Biblical “tooth for a tooth” business.

3. The Boy With 232 Teeth

Ashik Gavai was a seventeen-year-old Indian boy in a lot of pain. The right side of his jaw was swelling up like a balloon, and the local doctor didn’t know what to do. Worried the culprit was cancer, his parents took the boy to a team of specialists in Mumbai. Once they started poking around inside his mouth the doctors made an incredible discovery.

Ashik was suffering from a complex composite odontoma. A benign tumor was growing on the teenager’s jaw and essentially turned Ashik’s gums into a tooth factory. Over a seven hour operation, doctors removed 232 “pearl-like” teeth from the boy’s mouth. The four surgeons even discovered a “marble-like” brick and were forced to use a hammer and chisel to break it apart.

Hopefully the doctors removed every rogue tooth in Ashik’s mouth. If not, there’s a chance the odontoma might return. At least there’s a bright side to this macabre little tale — the world record for tooth removal from an odontoma is thirty-seven, so perhaps Ashik might get his name into Guinness.

2. The Man With A Tooth In His Nose

Nose bleeds are pretty common. In fact, three out of five people will suffer from “epistaxis” before they die. But if you’re experiencing nose bleeds once or twice a month, then there might be a problem. A twenty-two-year-old man was getting tired of constantly having to shove cotton balls up his nose, and after having multiple nosebleeds over three years he finally went to see his doctor. What the physician found was kind of horrifying.

There was a tooth growing in the man’s left nostril. It was about one centimeter long and had erupted through the floor of his nasal cavity. Surgeons were able to remove the tooth without any problems, but why was it there in the first place? Well, about 0.15% to 3.9% of people in the world actually have spare teeth. Known as mesiodentes, these extra chompers turn around and grow the wrong way, occasionally popping up inside the nose.

It’s kind of disgusting, but at least it’s understandable. But sometimes our genes get screwed up, and then things get really freaky. Take the case of Doug Pritchard. Back in 1978, Pritchard was a normal 13 year old kid living in North Carolina when his foot started to hurt. He put up with the pain for several weeks, but when he couldn’t take it anymore he went to the doctor… who found a tooth growing in his foot. Sounds like a bad horror movie.

1. Tooth-Eye Surgery

We’ll end with one of the craziest surgeries ever invented by man. In 2009, Martin Jones was a forty-two-year-old man who’d never seen his wife. Years before his wedding day he’d been blinded by an explosion of molten aluminum, but a corneal specialist named Christopher Lui promised to restore his vision with a radical operation known as modified osteo-odonot-keratoprosthesis (MOOKP). And it involved Martin’s front tooth.

After removing one of his canines, doctors drilled a small hole in the tooth and placed a lens inside. Next, they stitched the tooth into his cheek, allowing it to develop vessels and tissue before sticking the canine into Jones’ right eyeball. With the new lens firmly in place Jones could suddenly see everything, including his wife’s face.

Despite its effectiveness, MOOKP isn’t used much in the United States. American surgeons prefer a technique known as Boston Keratoprosthesis, which involves a prosthetic cornea. However, later in 2009 a team of doctors at the University of Miami became the first surgeons to perform the MOOKP operation in the U.S. The patient was a woman named Sharron Thornton who’d lost her vision due to a condition known as Stevens-Johnson syndrome. Thanks to one of her teeth and some mucus-filled cheek tissue, today Ms. Thornton can see everyone and everything around her.

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