A review of recent studies on self-healing smart composites for application in dentistry

Dental composites are widely used for dental restorations due to features such as maintaining the beauty of the teeth, non-invasive and conservative nature, and improving the physical and mechanical properties. Dental composites are susceptible to damages such as micro-cracking caused by thermal and mechanical stresses, which can weaken the properties of these materials. In dental composites, the detection of micro-cracks is very difficult and in some cases impossible. In addition, it is not possible to repair these damages in situ by using conventional materials and methods. Therefore, the self-healing ability in dental composites is necessary. In recent years, the spontaneous repair of damages such as micro-cracking in dental composite materials has been developed without any type of human intervention and the replacement of new components. The most common method for the preparation of self-healing dental composites is microencapsulation of healing agent in polymeric shell and dispersion of the prepared microcapsules in the acrylate matrix of dental composite. The self-healing properties of dental composites can be investigated by determining the fracture toughness of composites before and after healing performance using single edge V-notch beam test. In the present study, the studies on self-healing smart dental composites will be reviewed.