Topical fluoride treatment prevents dental caries. However, the resulting calcium-fluoride-like deposits are soft and have poor wear resistance; therefore, frequent treatment is required. Lasers quickly heat surfaces and can be made portable and suitable for oral remedies. We examined the morphology, nanohardness, elastic modulus, nanowear, and fluoride uptake of fluoride-treated enamel followed by CO2 laser irradiation for 5 and 10 sec, respectively. We found that laser treatments significantly increased the mechanical properties of the calcium-fluoride-like deposits. The wear resistance of the calcium-fluoride-like deposits improved about 34% after laser irradiation for 5 sec and about 40% following irradiation for 10 sec. We also found that laser treatments increased fluoride uptake by at least 23%. Overall, laser treatment significantly improved fluoride incorporation into dental tissue and the wear resistance of the protective calcium-fluoride layer.
The study of biotribology attracts increasingly attention because it holds great promise to have profound impact on the way people live their lives. This study presents two cases of contact mechanics study on tissue engineering: one in soft tissue and the other one in hard tissue. In the study of soft tissue, we conducted a theoretical investigation into the effect of particle on the adhesion of a biological nanostructure system. Based on a three-body contact model and JKR theory our results show that geckos’ spatulas provides robust adhesions even with trapped particles in the interface. In the case of hard tissue, we utilized nanoindentation technique to characterize the mechanical property and tribology behavior of calcium fluoride-like deposits on human tooth. The low nanohardness and high nano-wear depth characteristics of the surface deposits identified in this study account for the natural loss of the surface deposits days or weeks after topical fluoride treatment as a result of daily brushing and mastication.
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