The Future of Health (Regrowing teeth!), AI of the week, and Success

Thing 1 - Regrowing Teeth: The Future of Dental Health?

Losing a tooth has always meant a lifetime of dentures, implants, or bridges. But what if you could regrow your teeth?
Thanks to research by Dr. Katsu Takahashi and his team in Japan, this vision is on the horizon.

The Science: How It Works

The drug targets a protein called USAG-1, which acts as a brake on tooth growth. By using antibodies to interfere with USAG-1's binding to bone morphogenetic proteins (BMP), the drug reactivates the body’s ability to grow teeth. In animal studies, this method regrew functional teeth!

Human Trials and Who Benefits

Human clinical trials began in 2024 at Kyoto University Hospital, focusing on safety and effectiveness for adults with at least one missing tooth. Following the initial trials with adults, researchers plan to investigate the treatment's potential for children aged 2-7 with congenital tooth deficiency, offering a natural, lifelong solution without prosthetics or invasive procedures.

What Lies Ahead?

If trials progress as planned, the drug could be ready for clinical use by 2030. This puts a spotlight on the potential of advanced medical interventions to address so far intractable health issues and promote the body's natural healing capabilities - starting with your smile. (Cheesy, I know, but you'll be able to say "Cheese!" when asked. I'll see myself out 😂)

Thing 2 - AI of the week

I wrote a post about using AI to convert thoughts and ideas into action over at Practical AI School. Check it out, tell me what you think!

• Google took the cake by releasing Veo 2 - a video generation model that blows OpenAI's Sora out of the water, and it's not even close. (more demos)

Here's a cute ballerina dog demo - YES, THIS IS AI GENERATED!

• AGIROS, an AI robotics company in China, has started mass-producing their robots and integrating them into so many aspects of our daily lives.

• NVIDIA unveiled a new compact generative AI supercomputer - the Jetson Orin Nano Super Developer Kit - pulled it out of the oven, no cap lol
• OpenAI announced o3 topping 87.5% on the ARC-AGI benchmark (humans get 85% on ARC-AGI!!)

• A team of researchers unveiled Genesis - open-source physics engine that combines generative AI and simulations (how it works)
• Google released Gemini 2.0 Flash Thinking Experimental - Thinking Mode is capable of stronger reasoning capabilities in its responses than the base Gemini 2.0 Flash model
• Researchers introduced Exbody2 - Advanced Expressive Humanoid Whole-Body Control aka whole-body controller for humanoid robots

Thing 3 - Get the odds into your favor

Success is just a game of probabilities: as long as you have the humility to reevaluate your positions, the courage to rebuild who you are, the audacity to bet on the wildest outcomes, and the patience to stay the course, it's inevitable that good things will happen.

- Orange Book

On the flip side, if you don't go for what you want with everything you have and a clear head and hearth... how do you expect to get it?

Cheers, Zvonimir