| Glass-fiber-reinforced resin composites can have their bond strengths improved by increased wetting and spreading of resin phases into fiber spaces, or diminished by moisture adsorbed to hydrophilic glass surfaces. Gas plasma treatment, also known as glow-discharge treatment, is a rapid ambient-temperature process that can impart both increased surface energies and increased hydrophilicities to biomaterials. It would be potentially useful to apply such treatments in short procedures that might improve dental bonding performance. Glass-fiber-reinforced composite (FRC) resin posts provide esthetic benefits over metal posts previously utilized in endodontic treatment, but occasional bonding failure in the FRC post/resin build-up interphase zone is noted in clinical application. This investigation considered whether a short glow-discharge treatment (GDT) process could increase the initial bond strengths over those possible with as-supplied FRC posts, and whether these bond strengths would change within a short period of subsequent water immersion. (Abstract shortened by UMI.)... |
