Jumbo’s teeth is like nothing I’ve seen in any other elephant,” says Thomas. “It would have been really painful,” and inevitably caused terrible pain. MORE: ...

Those proteins, called suckerins, give the teeth their strength and stretchiness, ... known as Suckerin-19 and found in the crown of jumbo squid sucker ring teeth.

Jumbo's violent outbursts are believed to have been due to him struggling with pain, mainly toothache due to his malformed teeth, evident in later analyses of his skull.

Jumbo’s troubled journey began two decades earlier in the African bush, ... Although Jumbo was loved by his handlers, he was fed an improper diet and his teeth became painfully impacted.