Advancing Dental Education: Synergizing Virtual Reality, Haptics, AI, and Conventional Training for Green Clinical and Community Competence and Sustainability

Dear Colleagues,

The mastery of manual skills stands at the heart of dental education, forming the foundation for clinical competence and patient care. Traditionally, dental students have developed their fine motor skills through hands-on simulation exercises involving the preparation of artificial plastic teeth on dental arcades mounted on phantom head simulators. While these methods have long served as the backbone of preclinical training, they often fall short of replicating the nuanced tactile sensations encountered in real dental tissues. As a result, students may struggle to transfer their skills seamlessly from simulation to the clinical environment. Moreover, as dentistry increasingly emphasizes primary healthcare and community-based practice, students must now prepare for diverse working environments, including underserved settings, which traditional training methods have historically underexplored. This shift introduces additional challenges, as students need to adapt their skills to both clinical precision and community-oriented care, including educating patients and the public on oral health.

The digital revolution is reshaping this landscape. Innovations such as Augmented reality (AR), virtual reality (VR) simulators, haptic feedback devices, and AI-enhanced learning platforms now offer unprecedented opportunities to enrich the educational experience. VR haptic systems, for instance, immerse students in lifelike scenarios, allowing them to develop critical perceptual and motor skills in a safe, controlled, and repeatable setting. These technologies also address the growing emphasis on community dentistry and patient education by simulating scenarios like teledentistry (tele-consultations, tele-triage, tele-monitoring), preventive care delivery, or oral health literacy workshops for underserved populations. AI further augments this by offering personalized feedback and analytics to optimize learning outcomes. However, digital tools are not a replacement for traditional methods. Physical simulation with materials mimicking natural dental tissues remains essential for developing the tactile sensitivity required for procedures like caries removal, teeth preparation for fixed dental prostheses, or periodontal scaling.

This Special Issue will underscore a compelling truth—the future of dental education lies not in choosing between tradition and innovation, but in integrating both. Blending classic hands-on exercises with digital advancements accelerates skill acquisition, enhances student engagement, and fosters a deeper sense of confidence. Moreover, the thoughtful incorporation of well-being strategies can further reduce anxiety and promote holistic learning.

In this era of rapid change, the true source of innovation is synergy. By weaving together the strengths of conventional and digital methodologies, educators can unlock new dimensions of learning, ensuring that every student is equipped to thrive in the evolving world of dentistry.

Goal

This Special Issue of the MDPI Dentistry Journal sets out to explore a new era in dental education—one where the fusion of cutting-edge digital technologies with time-honored conventional hands-on training redefines what’s possible in skill and knowledge development. While the tactile mastery gained through traditional simulation and clinical work remains irreplaceable, the integration of immersive digital tools is proving to be the path to effective innovation. Digital systems, powered by advances in artificial intelligence and sophisticated feedback mechanisms, now offer educators and students unprecedented realism, interactivity, and accessibility.

This Special Issue seeks to explore how these technologies alleviate student anxiety, enable safe and repeatable practice, and deliver objective, standardized assessments, thereby accelerating motor skill acquisition and sharpening clinical decision-making. It will also examine their impact on student engagement and confidence, including in community dentistry and patient education, such as training for teledentistry, preventive care, or oral health communication with diverse populations.

Moreover, this topic will critically assess the practicalities of implementation, examining cost-effectiveness, logistical challenges, and the comparative value of digitally boosted training versus conventional methods. By bridging the gap between theory and hands-on practice, this discussion aims to empower educators, institutions, and technology developers to optimize these tools to uphold the highest standards of clinical proficiency, community-focused competence, and patient education skills.

Ultimately, the goal is to demonstrate that the most powerful educational outcomes emerge when tradition and innovation work together, preparing the next generation of dental professionals to excel in clinical practice, community-based care, and public/patient education within an evolving dental landscape.

Scope and Information for Authors

This Special Issue of the MDPI Dentistry Journal invites high-quality submissions exploring how VR, haptic feedback, AR, AI, and conventional methods can enhance dental education for clinical, community, and patient education competence. We welcome original research, systematic reviews, and meta-analyses that provide rigorous evidence or visionary insights. Contributions should focus on educational applications, including those relevant to community dentistry and public/patient education training.

Topics of Interest

Topics of interest include, but are not limited to, the following:

• VR-Haptic Simulators in Action: Explore how immersive VR-haptic environments transform the mastery of restorative, periodontal, prosthodontic, and surgical skills, offering students a safe, repeatable, and deeply engaging training ground.
• Tradition Meets Green Technology: Compare the strengths and limitations of classic training methods with cutting-edge digital platforms, revealing how each contributes to clinical, community, and patient education excellence.
• Sensory Revolution: Uncover breakthroughs in haptic feedback, immersive VR/AR simulations, and multisensory learning that push the boundaries of dental training and empathy.
• AI as a Digital Mentor: Investigate AI-driven tools that tailor learning experiences, provide instant feedback, and assess skills with unprecedented objectivity and insight.
• Virtual Platforms for Community Green Impact: Showcase virtual training environments that empower community dentistry, teledentistry, preventive care workshops, and oral health literacy initiatives for diverse populations.
• AI for Public Good: Examine how AI analytics and adaptive technologies optimize community-based training and patient education programs, making oral health accessible to all.
• Motivation and Mindset: Delve into the psychological and motivational effects of immersive technologies on dental students, uncovering what drives engagement and retention.
• From Theory to Green Practice: Address the real-world challenges, implementation strategies, and cost–benefit considerations of weaving VR, AR, and AI into dental curricula.
• Hybrid Models for Holistic Learning and sustainability: Propose synergistic approaches that blend digital and traditional methods to cultivate clinical expertise, community outreach, and patient education skills for the next generation of dental professionals.

We especially welcome submissions that explore how the synergy of VR, AR, haptics, and AI can bridge the gap between theoretical knowledge and practical expertise, making dental education more accessible, engaging, and effective than ever before, while preparing students for challenges such as delivering care or oral health education in diverse or resource-limited settings.

This Special Issue aims to inspire educators, researchers, and innovators to reimagine dental education as an integrated ecosystem of tradition and technology. By showcasing evidence-based practices and forward-thinking strategies, we seek to empower future dental professionals with clinical excellence, community-oriented competence, and effective patient education skills.

Dr. Szabolcs Felszeghy
Dr. Mihaela Pantea
Prof. Dr. Sompop Bencharit
Dr. Reinhard Chun Wang Chau
Guest Editors

Dr. Sıla Nur Usta
Prof. Dr. George Ghinea
Guest Editor Assistants

Manuscript Submission Information

Manuscripts should be submitted online at www.mdpi.com by registering and logging in to this website. Once you are registered, click here to go to the submission form. Manuscripts can be submitted until the deadline. All submissions that pass pre-check are peer-reviewed. Accepted papers will be published continuously in the journal (as soon as accepted) and will be listed together on the special issue website. Research articles, review articles as well as short communications are invited. For planned papers, a title and short abstract (about 100 words) can be sent to the Editorial Office for announcement on this website.

Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a single-blind peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Dentistry Journal is an international peer-reviewed open access monthly journal published by MDPI.

Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 2000 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.

• dental education
• community dentistry
• AI
• VR-haptic simulators
• haptics
• green clinical and community competence