Odontodes: The Developmental and Evolutionary Building Blocks of Dentitions

The odontode system, which encompasses teeth and other dentine-based structures, is ancient. Odontodes are present in the oldest vertebrate fossils, dating back 500 million years, and still play an important role in the anatomy and function of living jawed vertebrates. Fossils preserve odontode tissues with remarkable nanoscale fidelity, allowing the evolution and diversification of the odontode system to be studied in deep time as well as across the diversity of living vertebrates. This sy...