| Description |
Traditionally, oral tribology research involved the use of polydimethylsiloxane (PDMS) as a substitute for lingual tissue. This allowed researchers to construct custom surfaces with different topographies and varying moduli of elasticity. Although PDMS surfaces have been commonly used in oral tribology research, in vitro porcine tongues were used during this research due the similarities with the human tongue. This research focuses on the frictional and moisture effects produced by eleven mouthwash formulations, real and artificial saliva, and moisture variability when applied to porcine tongue tissue samples. Friction was measured using a Butterfly Haptics 6-axis magnetic levitation haptics device equipped with a custom tactor designed to mimic human skin and controlled by a hybrid force/position controller. Moisture was measured with a meter using a relative scale of 0-99 where 0 represents the minimum amount of moisture and 99 the maximum amount. A comparison of the effects of stimulated human saliva vs. artificial saliva demonstrated the human stimulated saliva had a greater friction coefficient and overall moisture content. Preliminary experiments demonstrated a decrease in friction determined by the amount of moisture present in the surface of the tongue. The friction coefficient and moisture content were discovered to reach average minimum values of approximately 0.35 and 10 respectively. These initial findings were confirmed by expanding the experiment to include a greater number of data points. The eleven mouthwash solutions were tested using 110 porcine tongue tissue samples and produced a lower friction coefficient than the artificial saliva while retaining the approximately the same amount of moisture. |
