John Walford McLean - the dental innovator who led the British development of resin composites

From publishing his first paper as a dental undergraduate in 1950 to the development of aluminous core porcelain in 1965, John Walford McLean was at the forefront of the British contribution to dental materials research. The ability to recognise material limitations at an early stage, combined with the confidence in his decision-making was what set John McLean apart from any dental innovator that had gone before - or arguably that came after! The British contribution to dental materials research was responsible for the introduction of reinforced dental porcelains, polyacrylic acid-base cements, glass-ionomer cements and the epoxy resin systems from 1943 to 1983 and John McLean, was at the forefront of these innovations. Depressingly in 1984, despite over 30 years at the coalface of dental materials development, McLean suggested gold and porcelain to be the two permanent dental materials available to the dental practitioner. In 1980, McLean predicted the future of aesthetic restorative dentistry lay in developing new technologies rather than the simple substitution of one material for another. He was not wrong!