Beyond light: evaluating the characteristics of lower-cost LED Curing Units for resin composite polymerization
Palavras-chave:
curing lights, light, polymerization, mechanical tests, composite resinsResumo
Objective: This study aimed to evaluate the irradiance (mW/cm2), emission spectrum (mW/nm), radiant exposure (J/cm²), beam profile, and depth of cure of a resin composite light-cured using different low-cost LED light-curing units (LCUs). Materials & Methods: It was tested the following devices: Dental Wireless; LY-A180; LY-B200. The VALO (polywave) and Elipar DeepCure-L (monowave) were used as control groups. Irradiance, emission spectrum, and radiant exposure were evaluated using the MARC Resin Calibrator. The Knoop microhardness test evaluated the depth of cure and elastic modulus. Depth of cure data was analyzed using the Shapiro-Wilk test, Levene’s test, ANOVA, Tukey HSD (α=0.05), and multiple linear regression analysis. Results: VALO and Elipar DeepCure-L showed a homogeneous radiant exitance. ANOVA showed that LCUs and restoration depth (p<.001) were significant, but the interaction was not. Multiple linear regression showed a significant relation between Elastic modulus, Irradiance, and depth of restoration (p=.350). Conclusions: Depth of cure tests showed that lower-cost LCUs tested showed satisfactory results; however, when all the variables were compared, they showed an inferior performance compared to the LCUs used as control.
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