[Image: Henadzi Pechan/istockphoto]
A root canal may take an hour, but waiting for a permanent crown often takes weeks.
Now, technology from a University of Texas at Dallas team could reduce the wait to just hours by replacing the multi-visit process typically required for zirconia restorations, a material the university calls the “gold standard” for permanent dental work.
In an announcement on Wednesday, UT Dallas said researchers have cracked a major manufacturing bottleneck that’s kept permanent, 3D-printed dental crowns out of dental offices.
A finished dental crown produced using a 3-D printing method developed by UT Dallas researchers. [Photo: UTD]
Developed with partners at Pan-AM Dental Laboratory and Arlington prosthodontist Amirali Zandinejad, the breakthrough could apply to a wide range of restorations, including crowns, bridges, and veneers. The technology still requires clinical validation and regulatory approval before commercial use, the university said.
“We are excited to be advancing the commercialization of chair-side 3D-printed, all-ceramic zirconia permanent dental restorations,” said Majid Minary, professor of mechanical engineering in the Erik Jonsson School of Engineering and Computer Science at UT Dallas, in a statement.
Minary said the same-day, custom-printed approach offers “greater personalization, faster treatment, and the convenience of receiving a permanent restoration in a single visit.”
Dr. Majid Minary (left) and mechanical engineering doctoral student Mahdi Mosadegh [Photo: UTD]
NSF grant backs commercialization
To help bring it to market, UT Dallas and its collaborators recently received a $550,000 grant from the National Science Foundation through its Partnerships for Innovation–Technology Translation program.
The commercialization effort also involves Grand Ledge, Michigan-based 3DCeram Sinto Inc., according to UT Dallas. The U.S. Air Force Office of Scientific Research also supported the research.
Why zirconia matters
Zirconia is used for permanent dental work because of its strength and durability, UT Dallas said. Currently, patients who want same-day crowns might find ceramic resin versions that aren’t as strong as zirconia, or opt for traditional zirconia crowns that require multiple visits and are milled from solid blocks of the material.
Milled zirconia restorations face limitations in design complexity and risks of micro-cracking during the process, accorind to UT Dallas. 3D printing, it says, offers better customization, color-matching, and a more efficient manufacturing process that could reduce cost and waste.
The manufacturing bottleneck—cut to 30 minutes
Printing the crown is just the start, and a complex process on its own. But the real challenge came in what followed: a time-intensive thermal phase that hardens the material into a durable, permanent restoration.
The process involves “debinding,” which removes the plastic binder, followed by “sintering,” which hardens the material at extremely high temperatures. But traditional debinding takes anywhere from 20 to 100 hours—too long for same-day dentistry.
“Debinding has been the bottleneck in the process,” Minary explained. “It must be done very slowly. If you speed it up, the polymer being burned off turns into gas, and if that gas cannot escape, the crown may crack or fracture.”
Minary’s team cut the debinding time to under 30 minutes with a new method they developed. The team’s research appears in the September issue of Ceramics International, a peer-reviewed materials science journal.
A dental crown is produced in a method developed by University of Texas at Dallas researchers. The approach combines enhanced heat transfer with the use of porous graphite felt, which can reach temperatures above 2,550 degrees Fahrenheit. [Photo: UTD]
The team includes mechanical engineering doctoral student Mahdi Mosadegh, who served as first author on the paper; Moein Khakzad; chemistry doctoral student Zahra Sepasi; mechanical engineering graduate student Kalyan Nandigama; and Golden Kumar, associate professor of mechanical engineering.
The team uses porous graphite felt—a heat-conductive material—to speed up debinding while allowing gas to escape, minimizing the risk of cracks, UT Dallas says.
“The combination of all of these features is what makes it work,” Minary said in the announcement. “With our technology, if a practitioner wants to offer a 3D-printed zirconia crown chair-side, they could provide it to a patient within just a few hours.”
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