“…Even dentine presents reported values of compressive strength that are significantly greater than its tensile strength (Craig & Powers, 2002). Some authors suggest the use of the Rankine or Maximum Normal Stress criterion to evaluate the failure in dentine, using the maximum principal stress to analyse the results (Ichim et al, 2006;Maceri et al, 2009;Nakamura et al, 2006). Others analyse the results of shear stress at the post-dentine interface, and indicate that this value should be compared to the reported shear bond strengths in order to evaluate the risk of loosing retention Maceri et al, 2009;Pegoretti et al, 2002).…”