Kazakh startup says no to dental drills

A Kazakh startup offers a way to painlessly treat caries, Tengrinews reports. The creators of the technology presented their development at an international commercialization forum in Astana.

The forum attracted 49 projects that received support under "Technology Commercialization" initiative in Kazakhstan. One of the startups present was LLP BIO Smart.

"We are developing recombinant proteins, peptides for the treatment of dental caries at an early stage. We all know that 90 percent of adults and children have some form of dental caries. The existing technologies currently used in the dental industry do not save and restore the destroyed tooth enamel and the tooth's integrity, becuase they mainly rely on drilling and filling," said the director of LLP BIO Smart Baurzhaan Aytuov.

Aytuov said that his project utilized a recombinant peptide that naturally restored the complete structure of the enamel at an early stage. This is when the dentist determines the stage of carious white spots and demineralization.

BIO Smart’s method sees the dentist cleaning the surface and adding a drop of the innovative preparation. In five minutes the peptide forms a hydrogel structure. Within a month this hydrogel absorbs calcium and phosphorus ions and forms calcium hydroxyapatite – the building element of teeth – which restores the affected area of enamel.

According to Aytuov, this new method of caries treatment relieves the patient of the annoying and oftentimes scary traditional dental drill procedures.

"Many people do not go to the dentist because they are afraid of the sound of a drill, the pain, the injections. In our method there is no pain medication, it can be used to treat children as well. It is a means of oral hygiene,” he explained.

The project director said that they had received a grant in the amount of $600 thousand. They were also negotiating a licensing agreement with a Swiss company. However, the production would stay in Kazakhstan.

Reporting by Assemgul Kassenova, writing by Dinara Urazova