Additive Manufacturing of Dental Materials

Dear Colleagues,

Additive manufacturing (AM) or 3D printing has become established in dentistry, and has caused a paradigm shift in the way objects are manufactured. These can be summarized as "digital workflows" in dentistry, and comprise three steps: 1. data acquisition, 2. data processing, and 3. data manufacturing by using subtractive or additive technologies. This enables the combination of standardized and automated production processes with the need to manufacture individual patient-specific parts.

AM now covers a wide range of applications in dentistry. Thereby, three developments can be differentiated. First, technical and educational applications, such as dental models, emerged. Later, clinical applications followed, mainly templates for guided intraoral treatments such as implant placement or orthodontic bracket placement. Currently, the third state of applications is becoming established, including removable and fixed therapeutic biofunctional appliances. These must withstand the aggressive intraoral environment, and must show resistance to humidity, high temperature variations, wear resistance, and functional loading.

This Special Issue, entitled “Additive Manufacturing of Dental Materials”, aims to provide scientific expertise across all areas of AM in dentistry. We welcome the submission of high-quality original research papers, review articles, communications, and case reports on topics including, but not limited to, the following:

• AM of therapeutic appliances including aligners, orthodontic appliances, removable and fixed prosthetic restorations;
• AM of templates and models;
• Material properties of polymers, metals and ceramics for AM;
• Post-processing and surface treatment procedures;
• Further, research areas related to AM and digital workflows like data acquisition and data modeling.

Dr. Christian Wesemann
Prof. Dr. Benedikt C. Spies
Guest Editors

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. Journal of Functional Biomaterials 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 2700 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.