Second Edition
© 2024 by Marcos Gridi-Papp, published under a CC BY-NC-SA 4.0 license.
First edition © 2018 at https://archive.org/details/cnx-org-col23864
University of the Pacific - Department of Biological Sciences
Welcome to Comparative Oral+ENT Biology. We created this textbook to support the multidisciplinary study of the mouth and associated structures. It integrates aspects of evolution, development, ecology, microbiology, structure and function. The main goal is to help college students interested in the subject to build a comprehensive background as a base for their graduate studies.
This book is designed for a semester-long course taken by undergraduate students who are preparing for careers in dentistry, medicine, veterinary, audiology, speech pathology or evolutionary biology. It explores the mouth, ears, nose and throat of humans and animals discussing their evolution, development, function, and some common clinical issues. The text provides a broad background through an integrative and organismal perspective. It crosses the boundaries of disciplines, anatomical regions and professions to present structures and mechanisms within an evolutionary context. This textbook is richly illustrated with images made available at Wikimedia Commons. It contains materials from and links to several sources of Open Education Resources.
Building an integrative perspective
The mouth and associated cavities in the head: nose, throat and ears make the subject of this book. An integrative view is developed in a multidisciplinary exploration of the content. Connections between structures, mechanisms and evolution are examined without restraint by the traditional separation between dentistry, otorhynolaryngology, veterinary, evolutionary biology or other related disciplines.
Comparative Oral+ENT Biology is written at a level suitable for college students with the basic background on animal structure, function and diversity that is usually built during the freshman year in the biology major. The book is intended to familiarize the reader with the major aspects of origin, structure, function and clinical relevance of each subject, favoring simplicity over completeness. It explores examples that illustrate the advantages of integrating across fields of knowledge to develop a holistic perspective of the subject. The reader will accrue a multidisciplinary knowledge base that will give context to specific concepts learned in graduate school. This knowledge base will facilitate collaboration with professionals specialized in other fields that are also dedicated to the mouth and associated cavities.
Latest technology for enhanced navigation
Most of the images are linked to the Media Explorer at Wikimedia Commons. This allows the reader to navigate a high-resolution version of each figure with a single click. The text of the online version is permeated with hyperlinks to Wikipedia, allowing the reader to easily expand on concepts of interest.
An open education resource
This book is made possible through the work of a large number of text authors, graphical artists and open education professionals. The text and figures range from being created by the editor, being inspired by other sources or being directly incorporated from open resources. Most images are made available by Wikimedia Commons, while text has been added or modified from various OpenStax College books, including Anatomy and Physiology, Biology, Microbiology and College Physics. Additional text has been added or modified from Wikipedia.
License
To broaden access and encourage community curation, Comparative Oral+ENT Biology is published under a CC BY-NC-SA 4.0 license. This enables reusers to distribute, remix, adapt, and build upon the material in any medium or format for noncommercial purposes only, and only so long as attribution is given to the creator. If you remix, adapt, or build upon the material, you must license the modified material under identical terms.
Cost
This textbook is available for free online.
Figure credits
Figure 1:
Open mouth by Lusb - Own work, CC BY 3.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=12839749
Sagittal head by Pereru - Own work, CC BY-SA 3.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=20067738, derived from https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Head_lateral_sagittal_mouth.jpg
Root canal procedure by Original version by Jeremy Kemp; SVG conversion by Jellocube27. - Root Canal Illustration with Molars by Jeremy Kemp (2005-03-22) using Adobe Illustrator; converted to SVG by Jellocube27 (2007-01-07); based on information from illustrations at www.animated-teeth.com., CC BY-SA 3.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=1550875
Mandibular fracture by Coronation Dental Specialty Group [1] - I'm an owner of the business and authorize use of the file, CC BY 3.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=24967149
Dog palate bypyrighted free use, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=320582
Horse larynx by de:Benutzer:Uwe Gille - Taken and uploaded on de:WP by de:Benutzer:Uwe Gille at 14:44, 3. Nov 2004 (CET), last edit at 10:55, 11. Mär 2005, CC BY-SA 3.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=514619
Tiger shark serrated teeth by Stefan Kühn, CC BY-SA 3.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=1089942
Jaw of sperm whale by Ryan Somma - Sperm Whale, CC BY-SA 2.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=11513035
Human ear by Anatomy_of_the_Human_Ear.svg: Chittka L, Brockmannderivative work: M Komorniczak -talk- - Anatomy_of_the_Human_Ear.svg, CC BY 2.5, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=7825624
Molar tooth anatomy by KDS4444 - Own work, CC BY-SA 4.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=52624520
Human tongue by ArnoldReinhold - Own work, CC BY-SA 3.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=252253
Saber tooth tiger skull by James St. John - Smilodon californicus saber-toothed tiger (Upper Pleistocene; California, USA), CC BY 2.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=40022318