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Scientists in an American school of dental medicine have developed a robot-powered hands-free oral care technology.

The American Dental Association reported that up to one billion plastic toothbrushes end up as garbage annually in the United States alone, amounting to up to 50 million pounds of waste. This consumeristic view of toothbrushes now has a chance to be eliminated by new oral care technology developed by researchers from the School of Dental Medicine and School of Engineering and Applied Science at the University of Pennsylvania, who have developed shapeshifting, microswarming robots to clean one's teeth.

The oral care industry might see a major shift in the near future as a multidisciplinary team from the University of Pennsylvania has created an automated way to brush and floss one's teeth using shapeshifting microswarming robots. It's specifically helpful for those who are incapable of cleaning their teeth themselves due to a lack of manual dexterity, Interesting Engineering reported.

The study was co-authored by Hyun (Michel) Koo, a professor at UPenn School of Dental Medicine's Department of Orthodontics and divisions of Community Oral Health and Pediatric Dentistry. Koo explained that cleaning one's teeth is a "manual, multistep process," involving brushing, flossing, and rinsing. The shapeshifting microswarming robots were developed to do all three oral care actions "in a single, hands-free, automated way."

How the shapeshifting microswarming robots work is that it is made up of nanoparticles that are controlled and shaped using magnetic fields, Edward Steager explained. Steager is a senior research investigator at Penn's School of Engineering and Applied Science and is also the co-author of the study.

The shapeshifting microswarming robots form bristles that can then "extend, sweep," and move from one space to another to create the action of flossing. It is powered by a system that can be programmed to assemble the nanoparticles and perform the motions.

Koo lamented that some aspects of oral care, specifically the toothbrush's basic "bristle-on-a-stick format," had "remained relatively unchanged for millennia." For decades, he said, the toothbrush design was never disrupted in any way, at least until today.

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In a press release, the scientists behind the new shapeshifting microswarming robots explained that fundamentally, this technology is made up of microrobots composed of iron oxide nanoparticles that have catalytic and magnetic activity. Researchers then used a magnetic field to direct the motion and configuration of these microbots to form "bristlelike structures" or "elongated strings" to emulate either a toothbrush or floss in order to clean teeth.

In addition to its shapeshifting capabilities, these oral care robots also produce antimicrobials that kill harmful bacteria thanks to its catalytic reaction. Researchers then used the robot-powered oral care system on mock and real human teeth to show its effectiveness. Results of the study were published in the journal ACS Nano.

Results showed that the microrobotics oral care tech could effectively remove biofilms and clear them of detectable pathogens. Moreover, the iron oxide nanoparticles used to create these microrobots have been FDA approved for other uses and have been shown to be safe to use around the gum tissue.

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