Advanced X-ray technology provides new insights into tooth decay
Cleaning teeth. Image by Tim Sandle.
New dental research finds that variety in enamel composition provides a means of predicting patterns with later tooth health. As lifespans become longer, cases of tooth decay are increasing. It follows that disparities in dental health make understanding tooth enamel more important. This is in the context of billions of cases of untreated cavities existing worldwide.
To overcome these difficulties, scientists from Northwestern University have demonstrated a new set of techniques to display structures in dental enamel. This has come about through the researchers mapping ions within human teeth. They have found significant structural differences between samples and this may enhance medical understanding of enamel’s life cycle and the overall impact on human health.
The challenge faced by the researchers is that there are very few techniques that can measure these particular ions within enamel crystallites accurately. The new approach therefore required ‘extreme accuracy’.
By deploying X-ray diffraction technology, the researchers were able to observe tiny differences (on the order of picometers) in the crystallographic parameters of enamel crystallites. These variations are linked to the presence of ions like magnesium and sodium or carbonate.
This finding leads to a new approach to measuring differences in tooth composition. presenting a previously unresearched, hard-to-measure scale of tooth enamel. For example, magnesium and carbonate ions are identified as controlling the solubility of enamel. Hence, the composition in tooth enamel may be critical to how and when teeth break down.
In the study, the researchers looked at three healthy teeth from human adults. Technology including synchrotron X-ray diffraction and unsupervised machine learning were used to examine healthy teeth from human adults. This revealed structures within the mesoscale (down to the level of single enamel rods and the surrounding inter-rod enamel). Each rod is an amalgam of around 10,000 crystallites, stacked together in an orderly fashion.
The researchers discovered differences in the lattice orientation and structure between enamel samples. By testing various samples, the researchers found there is a scale that can reveal new things like tooth formation and general health.
In time, challenging dental questions such as to why women are more susceptible to tooth decay and what happens in different groups of aging populations could be answered.
It is hoped that understanding the formation, function and composition of enamel will help medics to develop better therapies. The research has been published in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. The research is titled “Mesoscale Structural Gradients in Human Tooth Enamel.”
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