The currently used commercial self‐etching enamel‐dentin adhesives and restoratives composites are mainly based on a mixture of various monofunctional and cross‐linking dimethacrylates. New developments of enamel‐dentin adhesives concern the improvement of technique insensitivity and storage stability. Improvements of restorative composites are focused on the reduction of the polymerisation shrinkage, as well as the improvement of wear resistance, biocompatibility, and processing properties. In the past five years, many research efforts have been carried out to develop new monomers and tailor‐made components for filling materials, such as fillers or initiators. New phosphonic acid ether acrylates and cross‐linking bis(acrylamide)s enable the preparation of self‐etching enamel‐dentin adhesives with improved storage stability. With free‐radically polymerisable cyclic monomers, such as bicyclic cyclopropyl acrylates or cyclic allyl sulfides, low‐shrinkage storage‐stable restorative composites could be prepared. In case of the cationic polymerisable cyclic monomers, like siloxane‐based cycloaliphatic epoxides, the lower curing rate, stronger exothermic effect and lower curing depth compared to dimethacrylate‐based composites presently prevent their dental application. Designed methacrylates with tailor‐made properties and sol‐gel polycondensates can also contribute to the improvement of the currently used restorative composites. Radical polymerisable dental materials are initiated by light curing and by redox initiator systems. Under acidic conditions amine containing initiator systems are deactivated by acid‐base reaction. Non amine‐based initiators have to be developed for acidic monomer containing dental materials. The use of discrete nano‐filler particles mainly concerns the reinforcement and, in some cases, the increase of X‐ray opacity of composite filling materials.magnified image
Hydrogen-bonded, side-chain-functionalized supramolecular poly(alkyl methacrylate)s were investigated as light- and temperature-responsive reversible adhesives that are useful for bonding and debonding on demand applications. Here, 2-hydroxyethyl methacrylate (HEMA) was functionalized with 2-ureido-4[1H]pyrimidinone (UPy) via a hexamethylenediisocyanate (HMDI) linker, to create a monomer (UPy-HMDI-HEMA) that serves to form supramolecular cross-links by way of forming quadruple hydrogen bonded dimers. UPy-HMDI-HEMA was copolymerized with either hexyl methacrylate or butyl methacrylate to create copolymers comprising 2.5, 5, or 10 mol % of the cross-linker. The mechanical properties of all (co)polymers were investigated with stress-strain experiments and dynamic mechanical analysis. Furthermore, the adhesive properties were studied at temperatures between 20 and 60 °C by testing single lap joints formed with stainless steel substrates. It was found that increasing the concentration of the UPy-HMDI-HEMA cross-linker leads to improved mechanical and adhesive properties at elevated temperatures. Concurrently, the reversibility of the bond formation remained unaffected, where rebonded samples displayed the same adhesive strength as regularly bonded samples. Debonding on demand abilities were also tested exemplarily for one copolymer, which for light-induced debonding experiments was blended with a UV-absorber that served as light-heat converter. Single lap joints were subjected to a constant force and heated or irradiated with UV light until debonding occurred. The necessary debonding temperature was comparable for direct heating and UV irradiation and varied between 28 and 82 °C, depending on the applied force. The latter also influenced the debonding time, which under the chosen conditions ranged from 30 s to 12 min.
Cover: The pictures on the cover show the clinical follow up of a replacement of an amalgam restoration (A) by an adhesively placed tooth shaded composite filling. For this purpose, the surface of the cavity is etched and primed using a modern self-etching enamel-dentin adhesive (B). After filling the cavity with the composite and curing, a high esthetic tooth shaded composite restoration is created (C). Further details can be found in the article by N. Moszner* and U. Salz on page 245.
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