Abstract Objectives: Measurement of tooth enamel mineralization using a clinically viable method is essential since variation of mineralization may be used to monitor caries risk or in assessing the effectiveness of remineralization therapy. Fiber optic Raman systems are becoming more affordable and popular in context of biomedical applications. However, the applicability of fiber optic Raman systems for measurement of mineral content within enamel tissue has not been elucidated significantly in the prior literature. Materials and methods: Human teeth with varying degrees of enamel mineral content were selected. In addition alligator, boar and buffalo teeth which have increasing amount of mineral content, respectively, were also included as another set of samples. Reference Raman measurements of mineral content were performed using a high-fidelity confocal Raman microscope. The same set of samples were investigated by an OEM fiber optic Raman set up which was configured as a) non-confocal and b) confocal configurations to collect spectral information from similar locations investigated by the research-grade Raman microscope. The Raman spectroscopy measurements were compared to microcomputed tomography (micro-CT) observations. Results and conclusions: Analysis of human teeth by research grade Raman system indicated a 2-fold difference in the Raman intensities of V1 symmetric-stretch bands of mineral-related phosphate bonds and 7-fold increase in mineral related Raman intensities of animal teeth. Non-confocal fiber optic system failed to resolve the differences in the mineralization of human teeth. On the other hand, introduction of the in-line confocal module to the fiber optic system resulted in resolving the differences in mineral content for the two human teeth samples. These results indicate that the sampling volume of fiber optic systems extends to the underlying dentin and that confocal aperture modification is essential to limit the sampling volume to within the enamel. Portable Raman systems integrated with confocal fiber probe is promising for screening for enamel mineralization.
Keywords: enamel; mineral content; Raman spectroscopy