Functionally Graded Dental Implant and its Effect on Bone Remodeling

Abstract

Currently, titanium dominates the dental implant materials due to its strength and bio-inerrability. The use of titanium implant had demonstrated considerable surgical success. However, researchers are spontaneously pursuing better materials to achieve better osseointegration in the early stage of implantation. Recently, dental implants based on functionally graded material (FGM) were introduced in pursuit for the goal of enhanced bio-compatibility. The concept for FGM dental implant is that the property would vary in certain pattern to match the biomechanical characteristics required at different regions in the oral bone. However, mating properties do not necessarily guarantee better osseointegration and bone remodelling. There is no existing report available on the long-term effect of FGM dental implant on its hosting bone tissues. This paper aims at exploring this critical problem by using computational bone remodelling technique. The magnitude of bone remodelling due to use of FGM implant is identified over a healing period of four years. Comparisons were made between titanium and various FGM designs, the interesting differences were observed and the optimum FGM design was suggested based on the remodelling results.