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Updated: Oct 25, 2025

Somatosensory Event-related Potentials from Orofacial Skin Stretch Stimulation
Published on: December 18, 2015
Tactile sensation of natural teeth and dental implants in the somatosensory cortex
Duo Wang1, Jianxiang Tao2, Anqi Jin1
1Vision Research Laboratory, School of Life Sciences, The State Key Laboratory of Medical Neurobiology, Collaborative Innovation Center for Brain Science, Fudan University, Shanghai, China.
Purpose:
This study aimed to investigate the cortical response characteristics evoked by natural teeth and implants.
Methods:
Five cats were subjected to intrinsic signal optical imaging to measure the cortical responses evoked by natural teeth and implants. The difference in tactile sensation between the implant and natural tooth was compared in detail at the cortical response level.
Results:
Some similarities were observed between the implants and natural teeth. The stimulating-response curves of the implants and natural teeth were generally S-curves, and both implants and natural teeth preferred labial-lingual direction stimulation. The implants and natural teeth differed in terms of their tactile sensitivity: implants were weaker than natural teeth in terms of both static and dynamic sensitivity. However, after saturation, there was no significant difference in tactile strength between implants and natural teeth.
Conclusion:
Both natural teeth and implants are able to distinguish the tactile strength and stimulation direction. Although implants are less sensitive than the natural tooth, the maximal tactile function and directional preference of implants are similar to those of natural teeth.
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