Electrochemical treatment of infected titanium, an approach for biofilm obliteration

Peri-implantitis is a destructive inflammatory process affecting the soft and hard tissues surrounding dental implants, whereby progressive bone loss will result in the loss of the functional implant. Every year, 40% of dental implants get infected into such pathological conditions, and ultimately 10% fail. Existing techniques, such as physical and chemical methods, are either expensive or destructive on implants and none of them is entirely useful in cleaning implants or controlling their infections
We hypothesize that the electrochemical properties of titanium implants covered by pathological biofilm are different from those without infection. Therefore, we could determine the adequate electric parameters which is optimized to selectively destroy the pathological biofilm on titanium implants without affecting the surrounding healthy tissues.
Depending on the results, we will finally be able to introduce new technology and innovative method of using electric currents for the treatment of contaminated dental implants to the clinical field.

Faculty Supervisor:

Simon Tran

Student:

Partner:

Complutense University of Madrid

Discipline:

Life Sciences

Sector:

Education

University:

McGill University

Program: