A Novel Scheme and Evaluations on a Long-Term and Continuous Biosensor Platform Integrated with a Dental Implant Fixture and Its Prosthetic Abutment

Abstract

A miniature intra-oral dental implant system including a built-in biosensor device is proposed in this article. The dental implant system, or platform, is replaced over maxilla and allows relatively non-invasive procedures for a novel biosensing scheme for human blood analysis. Due to placement of the implant fixture, periodontal ligaments and the pulp structure, which are regarded as the main origin of pain, are thus removed, and long-term, continuous blood analysis and management through maxillary bone marrow becomes achievable through the dental implant platform. The new pathway of biological sensing is for the first time presented to realize an accurate and painless approach without injections. The dental implant system mainly consists of an implant fixture and a prosthetic abutment, a biosensor module, a bluetooth 4.0 wireless module and a dc button cell battery. The electrochemical biosensor possesses three electrodes, including working, reference and counter ones, which are arranged to pass through the titanium implant fixture below the biosensor module. The electrodes are exposed to the blood pool inside the maxillary bone marrow and perform oxidation/reduction reactions with the coating of biosensing enzyme. To prove the proposed platform, the immobilization process of glucose oxidase (GOD) enzyme and in vitro detections of glucose levels are successfully carried out, and proven sensitivity, linearity and repeatability of the glucose biosensor system are obtained. Moreover, a preliminary canine animal model adopting the new pathway shows significant consistency with the traditional method through dermal pricks for blood sugar detection. Despite the prospective results, further challenges in engineering implementation and clinical practices are addressed and discussed. In brief, the novel biosensing pathway and intra-oral biosensor platform may increasingly reveal their promising value and feasibilities in current bio-medical analysis, diagnosis, drug release and even healthcare technologies.

Development of a Dental Implantable Temperature Sensor for Real-Time Diagnosis of Infectious Disease

“…One additional consideration for a temperature sensor that was not discussed in this study is system integration including wireless data transfer and power delivery. In fact, system integration is one of the most actively studied areas for clinical applications such as glucose monitoring [ 39 ], oral activity recognition [ 40 ], and accelerating bone formation with electrical stimulation [ 41 ]. In such studies, the whole system integration was verified into a general dental implant platform for data transfer with a small battery for power delivery.…”

Materials and Biomedical Applications of Implantable Electronic Devices

“…Li and Lu once invented an intra-oral long-term continuous glucose monitoring system integrated with the Ti dental implant fixture (Figure 4b). [147] Three electrodes of the electrochemical biosensor were designed to pass through the titanium implant fixture and exposed to the blood pool inside the maxillary bone marrow. What is more, Li et al have fabricated a microneedle array based on the Ti porous structure for transdermal drug delivery (Figure 4c).…”

“…Reproduced with permission. [147] Copyright 2015, MDPI. c) Scheme of the fabrication process of titanium porous microneedle array (TPMA).…”

Conducting Polymers and Their Applications in Diabetes Management

“…Some attempts have been made, such as microneedles [70,71]. A non-invasive [17,72,73], continuous [74], long-term [74], or closed-loop [21]-based smart diabetes therapeutic system is needed for individual healthcare [1]. High conductivity, good biocompatibility, stability of chemical/physical properties, and the ability to entrap and controllably release biomolecules, enable CPs to be applied in “closed-loop” delivery devices [56,75].…”