Characteristic Translucency of Aesthetic Tooth Coating Materials

Abstract

Nowadays, the demand for esthetic dental treatment has become common amongst patients, especially for those cases of discolored teeth, in which bleaching is usually the first treatment choice. However, polymer-based tooth surface coating materials have recently been developed as an alternative to bleaching. The purpose of this study was to evaluate the optical characteristics of two tooth surface coating materials. The materials evaluated were WhiteCoat™(Kuraray Medical)and the experimental material SIR20209(Shofu). Each specimen was prepared with 1mm thickness and two different diameters, 5 and 10mm, respectively. The light transmittance, intensity distribution of the transmitted light, ΔE^*ab values between white and black background(translucency parameter, TP)and the contrast ratio were also measured. In addition, the specimens were observed under a scanning electron microscope(SEM). The findings of this study showed that SIR20209 had the highest translucency, whereas the opaque shade of WhiteCoat™ presented the lowest values of light transmittance, TP and contrast ratio. Moreover, the light transmittances of various shades of WhiteCoat™ were significantly lower than those presented by SIR20209. The intensity distribution of transmitted light showed a distinctive specular and diffuse transmission amongst the specimens. The Yellowish, Reddish, Whitish, Natural-0, BW0, and BW1 shades of SIR20209, and the enamel shade of WhiteCoat™, showed a strong component of light transmittance around 0 degrees. Some inorganic filler particles were observed with SEM in the surfaces of WhiteCoat™ and SIR20209.