Biomedical Engineering Reference
In-Depth Information
Fig. 7.1
Tapered implant
Fig. 7.2
Different screw designs of dental implants
The function of dental implants can be accomplished by a successful interface.
As shown in Fig.
7.3
, the interface of a dental implant system includes (A) the
occlusal surface, (B) a crown-abutment interface, (C) a crown-fi xing screw inter-
face, (D) a fi xing screw-central screw interface, (E) a central screw-abutment
interface, (F) an abutment-implant interface, (G) a central screw-implant interface,
(H) an implant-layer interface, (I) and an implant-bone interface.
In fact, due to masticatory motion, friction and wear with different amplitudes
(from microns to millimeters) and modes (fretting and sliding wear) may occur at
the above interfaces. Chapter
3
presents the sliding wear behavior of occlusal sur-
faces. In addition, the fretting behavior of the interfaces [from (b) to (h) of Fig.
7.3
]
of the implant system similar to that of engineering materials has been widely inves-
tigated in the literature. Therefore, our research simulated the fretting wear of the
bioactive implant-bone interface, and we present the results here.
7.2
Fretting Wear of the Dental Implant-Bone Interface
Dental implants for replacing one or more missing teeth caused by old age or acci-
dents as well as for aesthetic purposes are becoming common due to the better suc-
cess rate of implantations [
9
]. However, despite the low failure rate [
10
], because
dental implants have become an especially important therapeutic modality in the
last decade, the number of failures is large. After the clinical success of osseointe-
gration, there was undoubtedly a certain degree of micromotions in the bone-dental
