Intelligent Material: the essence of smart materials

Abstract

There is no single material in dentistry that is ideal in nature and fulfils all the requirements of an ideal material. As the quest for an “ideal restorative material” continues, a newer generation of materials was introduced. These are termed as “smart’’. These smart materials are materials that have properties which may be altered in a controlled fashion by stimuli, such as stress, temperature, moisture, pH, and electric or magnetic fields. Thus, smart materials respond to stimuli by altering one or more of their properties. Smart behaviour occurs when a material can sense some stimulus from its environment and react to it in a useful, reliable, reproducible, and usually reversible manner. The use of smart materials has revolutionized dentistry such as smart composite, NITI smart alloy, smart seal obturation system and self-healing composite.