Calcium orthophosphates as a dental regenerative material

Abstract Dental caries, also known as tooth decay or a cavity, remains a major public health problem in most communities even though the prevalence of disease has decreased since the introduction of fluoride for dental care. In addition, there is dental erosion, which is a chemical wear of the dental hard tissues without the involvement of bacteria. Besides, there are other dental losses, which may be of a medical (decay or periodontal disease), age (population aging), traumatic (accident), or genetic (disorders) nature. All these cases clearly indicate that biomaterials to fill dental defects appear to be necessary to fulfill customers’ needs regarding the properties and the processing of the products. Bioceramics and glass-ceramics are widely used for these purposes, as dental inlays, onlays, veneers, crowns, or bridges. Among these, calcium orthophosphates (CaPO 4 ) has some specific advantages over other types of biomaterials due to a chemical similarity to the inorganic part of both human and mammalian teeth and bones. Therefore CaPO 4 (both alone and as constituents of various complex formulations) is used in dentistry as both fillers and implantable scaffolds. This review provides a brief knowledge on CaPO 4 and describes in details current state-of-the-art on their applications in dentistry and dentistry-related fields. Among the recognized dental specialties, CaPO 4 is most frequently used in periodontics; however, the majority of the publications on CaPO 4 in dentistry are devoted to unspecified “dental” fields.