Oral Histology
A PerioWiki entry
Gingival epithelium
The first tissue type one encounters in the mouth is epithelium. The epithelium differs for different areas in the mouth such as lining mucosa and masticatory mucosa. There is also specialized mucosa that covers the tongue. Epithelium in the mouth can be non-keratinized, parakeratinized or orthokeratinized.
The gingival epithelium is divided in the following parts:
Junctional epithelium consists of the dentogingival junction and sulcular epithelium.
In general, oral epithelium is stratified squamous and organized in the following layers depending if keratinized or non-keratinized:
| Keratinized | Non-keratinized |
| S. basale | S. basale |
| S. granulosum | ?? |
| S. spinosum | ?? |
| S. squamosum | ?? |
The differences between attached gingiva and lining mucosa are as follows:
Needs to be added
Epithelial cells in the Gingiva are anchored mostly through desmosomes. Gap junctions and occludens junctions are rare. Epithelium is also anchored with hemidesmosomes to teeth and the basemement membrane
