Nanotech dental fillings may last longer

AUGUSTA, Ga., July 2 (UPI) -- A U.S. researcher is using nanotechnology to help tooth-colored dental fillings last longer.

Dr. Franklin Tay of the Medical College of Georgia in Augusta says he is trying to prevent fillings from degrading.

"Dentin adhesives bond well initially, but then the hybrid layer between the adhesive and the dentin begins to break down in as little as one year," Tay says in a statement. "When that happens, the restoration will eventually fail and come off the tooth."

Tay is trying to prevent the aging and degradation of the bond between resin fillings and tooth dentin bonding in teeth by feeding minerals back into the collagen network of the dentin, using a new nanotechnology process of growing extremely small, mineral-rich crystals and guiding them into the demineralized gaps between collagen fibers.

If Tay's concept of guided tissue remineralization works, the crystals should lock the minerals into the dentin and prevent the filling from failing, he says.

"Instead of dentists replacing the teeth with failed bonds, we're hoping that using these crystals during the bond-making process will provide the strength to save the bonds," Tay says. "Our end goal is that this material will repair a cavity on its own so that dentists don't have to fill the tooth."