The lead researcher behind dentures inspired by octopus suckers shares what drew him to the sea creatures and outlines the next steps in the research.
A team of researchers from King’s College London has created a new type of denture with octopus-inspired suckers. Designed for improved grip and comfort, the scientists explored how they could replicate the suckers octopuses have on their eight arms which allow them to attach to surfaces.
Following this research, they found that the new denture design had twice the amount of retention as standard dentures.
Lead researcher Sherif Elsharkawy shares what impact these dentures could have on the public and what excites him about the research.
What made you look at octopuses for this research?
We looked at octopuses because they are very special creatures in nature. They survived because of their tentacles which have suckers to allow them to stick to different surfaces, hide and hunt prey.
They need to survive in a very challenging, very wet environment, like the deep sea. And that’s how we got inspired, because it’s basically the same problem that we have with dentures. We need them to survive in a challenging, wet environment.
The mouth is full of saliva and mechanical challenges, such as biting and eating. As a result, we thought that multiple, small suckers on the fitting surface of dentures could potentially make the denture stick better to the mucosa in the mouth.
What impact could these dentures have on the public if successful?
A lot of patients could benefit from using these dentures because they may not require extra adhesives. Patients may not enjoy using denture adhesive, and these dentures could have enough retention for them to grip without adhesive which will impact a lot of people.
A lot of patients don’t like denture adhesive because it changes the taste of the food, it changes the perception of how to use a denture. It’s also not hygienic, and cleaning the denture becomes very difficult due to the denture adhesive.
They could also impact some patients who had cancer or who are not in a financial position to afford implants. For example, some cancer patients may not be suitable for implants because of radiotherapy or due to the nature of their medical condition.
These dentures could be an affordable option while also providing a strong grip, meaning the patient would not have to use implants.
This research has made a huge impact over the last few weeks – I have been getting emails from all over the globe. People really want to hear more about it and patients want to try it.
What’s the next stage in this research?
We are still at the development stage, and we’re going to do some initial clinical trials with our healthy volunteers at King’s College London, so that will be the first cohort. We also need to investigate how it’s going to behave in that challenging environment.
We are also testing how it’s going to behave with the presence of biofilm and bacteria in the mouth. This is one of the things that we need to be careful with, so we’re now trying to test it with multiple chemical and physical cleaning methods that are available to patients for cleaning.
These dentures rely on the use of 3D printing technology that we have available nowadays. We currently have a lot of 3D printing capability, and dentists have access to these printing facilities, but with time, 3D printers will get even better in resolution. As they get better in resolution, the dentures will improve even more because the suckers will get smaller, have higher density on the surface, and potentially become more beneficial. This means we can add more suckers onto the surface to make it even more retentive, so it’s only going to improve in the future.
We hope that our future efforts are successful in order to offer this treatment to our patients. We have had a really good attention from the media, from other dental colleagues and patients who are asking for the denture, so it’s making a really good impact.
What excites you about this research?
I see a lot of denture patients as a prosthodontic consultant, so it’s my kind of bread and butter. All week I see patients who wear complete dentures, and the amount of frustration they go through and the lack of satisfaction they have, especially on the lower denture, needs to change.
We need to advance our treatment to make sure that patients can have a better lifestyle when they get older. What excites me is the possibility of providing better care for the older population.
The older population is growing massively now, with patients getting older and older, so there will probably be a lot more dentures in the future.
Click here to find out more about the research findings.
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