Topographic characterization of canine teeth using atomic force microscopy images in nano-scale

Abstract

The purpose of the present study was to investigate a new method to evaluate micro topography and micro morphology of hard tissue of canine teeth using an atomic force microscope (AFM). For this aim, three extracted human canine teeth were applied. The unpolished surfaces were analyzed with AFM images with 15 µm × 5 µm area and their information obtained by power spectral density (PSD) method and fast Fourier transform algorithm. It was observed that PSD analyses extract suitable information about surface morphological variations so that by moving from enamel to cementum, the fractal dimension and surface complexity were increased.