Tenth Ratón Pérez Campaign

Monday 11 September 2023

This year, milk teeth will be collected in Burgos from September 25th to 29th, to continue expanding the RP Collection for the purposes of paleoanthropological and forensic research.

The milk tooth collection Campaign organized by the Centro Nacional de Investigación sobre la Evolución Humana (CENIEH), with the support of the Fundación Española para la Ciencia y la Tecnología (FECYT) – Ministerio de Ciencia e Innovación, and the Fundación “la Caixa”, through CaixaBank, returns to Burgos from September 25th to 29th.
This tenth edition of the Ratón Pérez Campaign will take place at the CENIEH itself from Monday through Thursday, 5 pm to 7 pm, and on Friday 29th, coinciding with European Researchers' Night, from 6 pm to 9 pm.
The purpose of this Campaign, coordinated by Marina Martínez de Pinillo, of the Dental Anthropology Group, and Chitina Moreno-Torres, the head of the UCC+I, both at the CENIEH, is to continue expanding the Ratón Pérez Collection (RP Collection) to support paleoanthropological, forensic and dental research.
All persons interested in participating should make an appointment from September 11th, on the website of Eventbrite:, and download the form. This needs to be completed and submitted together with the dental piece in question.
In exchange for their teeth, donors will receive a souvenir and a certificate of having assisted Ratón Pérez and the CENIEH Dental Anthropology Group, as well as merchandise from the Casita Museo del Ratón Pérez.
Thanks to citizen collaboration, the RP Collection currently holds over 4500 dental pieces from boys and girls aged from 2 to 15 at the moment of tooth loss. Most donors are from Spain, although other countries such as Australia, China, France, India, Mexico, the Netherlands, the Dominican Republic, and Russia are also represented.


Collaborating institutions
Universities from all over Spain and other institutions have been fundamental to the success of this project. Together with the Casita Museo del Ratón Pérez, the CSIC Office in Galicia, the Alba Synchrotron in Barcelona, and the universities of Córdoba, Extremadura, Granada, Jaén, Zaragoza, and the Rey Juan Carlos in Madrid, will continue their collaboration this year. For the first time, these are also joined by a dental clinic, the Clínica BUQUO, which has practices in Burgos and Aranda de Duero.
As Martinez de Pinillos explains, “We have reached this tenth edition thanks not only to the donors but to all the collaborating institutions that have accompanied us year after year. We hope to continue being able to rely on all of them to carry on expanding the RP Collection and conduct research which would otherwise prove impossible”.