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A Solution Looking for Problems?
LETTERS TO THE EDITOR
A solution looking for problems? D I have often thought, and I'm sure many other practitioners have as well, that a misshapen, warped lingual bar might be brought back to its original laboratory-molded form if only we could induce' the metal to "remember" how it was before circumstance led it astray. I have stood many times with a tragically misfitting appliance, hoping to guess its original shape and succeeding only occasionally. In the November 1979 issue of Scientific American, L. McDonald Schetky, in an article entitled "Shape-Memory Alloys," says categorically that some artificially shaped alloys ("those that can shift
into the configuration known as martensite") do indeed possess a memory of their imposed shape and will revert to it if the metal is heated to a temperature above that previously used to form the material. " Shape memory is a solution looking for problems," the author says. Several applications are suggested. The use of this material in certain orthopedic instances is already being developed by Alan A. Johnson of the University of Louisville and Frank P. Alicandri of Polytechnic Institute of New York. Of particular interest to dentists was this statement: "Another orthopedic problem is the pulling together of the parts of a fractured bone to insure their alignment. ... With plates of Nitinol, which are
installed chilled, body heat pulls the fractured parts of the bones into alignment." May there not be a host of dentofacial problems awaiting this new knowledge in the near future , aside from the need to bring a warped lingual bar to its former proper state? I. JOSEPH GLAZER, DDS
ATLANTA
Editor's note: Nitinol (ni for nickel, ti for titamum , and nol for Naval Ordnance Laboratory where it was developed) has been the subject of various articles in the dental literature during the past few years. A package library containing these articles may be borrowed, for a service fee of $5, from the Association 's Bureau of Library Services.
THE PRESIDENTS
Each month, The Journal prints the picture of a past president of the American Dental Association with a brief biography and a few historical highlights of his presidential year. The series began in February 1979 with the first president and is continuing in chronological order.
Phineas George Canning Hunt 1872-1873 Doctor Hunt of Indianapolis was elected 12th president of the Association at the 1872 meeting at Niagara Falls. A resolution was adopted at that meeting recognizing and honoring Doctor Horace Wells as the introducer of anesthesia in the United States. Doctor Hunt, president of the Indiana State Dental Association from 1861 to 1864, was again elected to that office in 1871. He invented severeJ devices and methods useful to practicing dentists. He was born in Ohio in 1827 and died in 1896. Ulysses S. Grant was re-elected president in 1872, defeating Horace Greeley. In the Credit Mobilier scandal, it was revealed that the outgoing vice president and a number of members of Congress held stock for which they had not paid, in the Credit Mobilier, the construction company that built the Union Pacific Railway. }ADA, Vol. 100, January 1980 • 15
A solution looking for problems? D I have often thought, and I'm sure many other practitioners have as well, that a misshapen, warped lingual bar might be brought back to its original laboratory-molded form if only we could induce' the metal to "remember" how it was before circumstance led it astray. I have stood many times with a tragically misfitting appliance, hoping to guess its original shape and succeeding only occasionally. In the November 1979 issue of Scientific American, L. McDonald Schetky, in an article entitled "Shape-Memory Alloys," says categorically that some artificially shaped alloys ("those that can shift
into the configuration known as martensite") do indeed possess a memory of their imposed shape and will revert to it if the metal is heated to a temperature above that previously used to form the material. " Shape memory is a solution looking for problems," the author says. Several applications are suggested. The use of this material in certain orthopedic instances is already being developed by Alan A. Johnson of the University of Louisville and Frank P. Alicandri of Polytechnic Institute of New York. Of particular interest to dentists was this statement: "Another orthopedic problem is the pulling together of the parts of a fractured bone to insure their alignment. ... With plates of Nitinol, which are
installed chilled, body heat pulls the fractured parts of the bones into alignment." May there not be a host of dentofacial problems awaiting this new knowledge in the near future , aside from the need to bring a warped lingual bar to its former proper state? I. JOSEPH GLAZER, DDS
ATLANTA
Editor's note: Nitinol (ni for nickel, ti for titamum , and nol for Naval Ordnance Laboratory where it was developed) has been the subject of various articles in the dental literature during the past few years. A package library containing these articles may be borrowed, for a service fee of $5, from the Association 's Bureau of Library Services.
THE PRESIDENTS
Each month, The Journal prints the picture of a past president of the American Dental Association with a brief biography and a few historical highlights of his presidential year. The series began in February 1979 with the first president and is continuing in chronological order.
Phineas George Canning Hunt 1872-1873 Doctor Hunt of Indianapolis was elected 12th president of the Association at the 1872 meeting at Niagara Falls. A resolution was adopted at that meeting recognizing and honoring Doctor Horace Wells as the introducer of anesthesia in the United States. Doctor Hunt, president of the Indiana State Dental Association from 1861 to 1864, was again elected to that office in 1871. He invented severeJ devices and methods useful to practicing dentists. He was born in Ohio in 1827 and died in 1896. Ulysses S. Grant was re-elected president in 1872, defeating Horace Greeley. In the Credit Mobilier scandal, it was revealed that the outgoing vice president and a number of members of Congress held stock for which they had not paid, in the Credit Mobilier, the construction company that built the Union Pacific Railway. }ADA, Vol. 100, January 1980 • 15