Tooth vs. Tusk — What's the Difference?

A tooth (plural teeth) is a hard, calcified structure found in the jaws (or mouths) of many vertebrates and used to break down food. Some animals, particularly carnivores and omnivores, also use teeth to help with capturing or wounding prey, tearing food, for defensive purposes, to intimidate other animals often including their own, or to carry prey or their young.

Tusks are elongated, continuously growing front teeth that protrude well beyond the mouth of certain mammal species. They are most commonly canine teeth, as with pigs and walruses, or, in the case of elephants, elongated incisors.

Each of a set of hard, bony enamel-coated structures in the jaws of most vertebrates, used for biting and chewing

A long pointed tooth, especially one which protrudes from the closed mouth, as in the elephant, walrus, or wild boar.

A projecting part on a tool or other instrument, especially one of a series that function or engage together, such as a cog on a gearwheel or a point on a saw.

An elongated pointed tooth, usually one of a pair, extending outside of the mouth in certain animals such as the walrus, elephant, or wild boar.

An appetite or liking for a particular thing

A long projecting tooth or toothlike part.

Roughness given to a surface to allow colour or glue to adhere

See cusk.

One of a set of hard, bonelike structures in the mouths of vertebrates, usually attached to the jaw or rooted in sockets and typically composed of a core of soft pulp surrounded by a layer of hard dentin that is coated with cementum or enamel at the crown and used for biting or chewing food or as a means of attack or defense.

To gore or dig with the tusks or a tusk.

A similar hard projection in an invertebrate, such as one of a set of projections on the hinge of a bivalve or on the radula of a snail.

One of a pair of elongated pointed teeth that extend outside the mouth of an animal such as walrus, elephant or wild boar, and which continue to grow throughout the animal's life.

A projecting part resembling a tooth in shape or function, as on a comb, gear, or saw.

A small projection on a (tusk) tenon.

A small, notched projection along a margin, especially of a leaf. Also called dent2.

A tusk shell.

A rough surface, as of paper or metal.

(carpentry) A projecting member like a tenon, and serving the same or a similar purpose, but composed of several steps, or offsets, called teeth.

Often teeth Something that injures or destroys with force

A sharp point.

Teeth Effective means of enforcement; muscle

The share of a plough.

To furnish (a tool, for example) with teeth.

A fish, the torsk (Brosme brosme).

To make a jagged edge on.

To dig up using a tusk, as boars do.

To become interlocked; mesh.

To gore with the tusks.

A hard, calcareous structure present in the mouth of many vertebrate animals, generally used for eating.

(obsolete) To bare or gnash the teeth.

A sharp projection on the blade of a saw or similar implement.

Same as Torsk.

A projection on the edge of a gear that meshes with similar projections on adjacent gears, or on the circumference of a cog that engages with a chain.

One of the elongated incisor or canine teeth of the wild boar, elephant, etc.; hence, any long, protruding tooth.

Of a rope, the stickiness when in contact with another rope as in a knot.

A toothshell, or Dentalium; - called also tusk-shell.

(zoology) A projection or point in other parts of the body resembling the tooth of a vertebrate animal.

A projecting member like a tenon, and serving the same or a similar purpose, but composed of several steps, or offsets. Thus, in the illustration, a is the tusk, and each of the several parts, or offsets, is called a tooth.

(botany) A pointed projection from the margin of a leaf.

To bare or gnash the teeth.

(animation) The rough surface of some kinds of cel or other films that allows better adhesion of artwork.

A hard smooth ivory colored dentine that makes up most of the tusks of elephants and walruses

(figurative) Liking, fondness (compare toothsome).

A long pointed tooth specialized for fighting or digging; especially in an elephant or walrus or hog

(algebraic geometry) An irreducible component of a comb that intersects the handle in exactly one point, that point being distinct from the unique point of intersection for any other tooth of the comb.

Stab or pierce with a horn or tusk;

To provide or furnish with teeth.

Remove the tusks of animals;

To indent; to jag.

To lock into each other, like gear wheels.

One of the hard, bony appendages which are borne on the jaws, or on other bones in the walls of the mouth or pharynx of most vertebrates, and which usually aid in the prehension and mastication of food.

Fig.: Taste; palate.

Any projection corresponding to the tooth of an animal, in shape, position, or office; as, the teeth, or cogs, of a cogwheel; a tooth, prong, or tine, of a fork; a tooth, or the teeth, of a rake, a saw, a file, a card.

A projecting member resembling a tenon, but fitting into a mortise that is only sunk, not pierced through.

An angular or prominence on any edge; as, a tooth on the scale of a fish, or on a leaf of a plant

Any hard calcareous or chitinous organ found in the mouth of various invertebrates and used in feeding or procuring food; as, the teeth of a mollusk or a starfish.

To furnish with teeth.

To indent; to jag; as, to tooth a saw.

Hard bonelike structures in the jaws of vertebrates; used for biting and chewing or for attack and defense

Something resembling the tooth of an animal

Toothlike structure in invertebrates found in the mouth or alimentary canal or on a shell

A means of enforcement;

One of a number of uniform projections on a gear