UIC Distinguished Professor Alexander Yarin and a team of researchers at UIC invented a product that helped the dental industry and made it safer. Dentistry was one of many fields impacted during the global COVID-19 pandemic. Dentists had to navigate how to treat their patients while maintaining safe working environments for everyone in their offices.
Dentists frequently use ultrasonic scaling tools known as Cavitrons, which use vibrations and water to clean teeth. The tool produces a sound wave that creates vibrations in its tip and also releases water adjacent to the tooth to create cavitating bubbles, which loosen plaque and tartar from teeth. The water flow simultaneously washes away the debris while cooling the Cavitron.
While the device can remove up to 50% more biofilm than hand scaling and is much faster than the latter, it also aerosolizes water and saliva droplets into the air. The aerosolized droplets carry bacteria and viruses and transmit diseases—including COVID-19—to other patients and health providers. In addition, it was proven that droplets smaller than approximately 20 micrometers evaporate faster than they settle, and thus, pathogens of approximately 100 nanometers in size become fully airborne.
During the lockdown, the UIC College of Dentistry turned to UIC's College of Engineering to help improve the ventilation and catch some droplets created by the Cavitrons and dental drills. "I immediately propose another idea to change a little bit of the irriga.