Abstract
Nowadays, there is a great demand for Zirconia dental ceramics, while the existing low-cost automated polishing methods are quite limited. We propose a novel polishing methodology employing the shear-thickening slurry (STF) comprising starch and SiC abrasive particles. This polishing method enhances viscosity under applied pressure, offering an approach to address the identified challenge. A series of polishing experiments and an in vitro study are conducted to assess the effectiveness of this method compared to manual polishing. The feasibility of the proposed method for polishing dental veneer and crown ceramics is investigated as well. With 2000# SiC-STF slurry, 300 r/min fixture and 120 r/min workpiece, the minimum surface roughness Ra of polished surface can reach 9.5 nm after 30 min. Furthermore, both the novel and manual polishing methods result in samples with comparable flexural strength. Importantly, the innovative use of STF exclusively employs mechanical friction for material removal, circumventing potential chemical erosion. This work can bring a low-cost, efficient, and non-toxic automated polishing method for dental ceramics.
Similar content being viewed by others
Data availability
All data generated or analysed during this study are included in this published article and its supplementary information files.
References
Shishido, S. et al. Residual stress associated with crystalline phase transformation of 3–6 mol% yttria-stabilized zirconia ceramics induced by mechanical surface treatments. J. Mech. Behav. Biomed. Mater. 146, 106067 (2023).
Wertz, M. et al. Phase transformations in yttria-partly stabilized zirconia induced by dental Polishing regimes. J. Mater. Sci. 59, 6479-6496. (2024).
Chen, L. et al. Comparison of bacterial adhesion and biofilm formation on zirconia fabricated by two different approaches: an in vitro and in vivo study. Adv. Appl. Ceram. 119, 323–331 (2020).
Koudriavtsev, T. V. & Villalobos, J. S. Crystallographic and topographic analysis of Ultra-Translucent zirconia after various surface Treatments, Odovtos. Int. J. Dent. S. 26, 101–112 (2024).
Aurelio, I. L., Marchionatti, A. M. E., Montagner, A. F., May, L. G. & Soares, F. Z. M. Does air particle abrasion affect the flexural strength and phase transformation of Y-TZP? A systematic review and meta-analysis. Dent. Mater. 32, 827–845 (2016).
Zhang, F., Reveron, H., Spies, B. C., Van Meerbeek, B. & Chevalier, J. Trade-off between fracture resistance and translucency of zirconia and lithium-disilicate glass ceramics for monolithic restorations. Acta Biomater. 91, 24–34 (2019).
Hashemikamangar, S. S., Nahavandi, A. M., Daryadar, M., Valizadeh, S. & Özcan, M. Effect of glazing and Polishing on opalescence and fluorescence of dental ceramics. Clin. Exp. Dent. Res. 8, 1645–1654 (2022).
Makkeyah, F., Moustafa, D. M., Bakr, M. M. & Al Ankily, M. Effect of two different intraoral Polishing systems on surface Roughness, color Stability, and bacterial accumulation of Zirconia-Reinforced lithium silicate ceramic. Eur. J. Dent. 18, 1069–1075 (2024).
Atash, R. et al. Evaluation of the effectiveness of four composite Polishing systems: an in vitro study. Int. J. Periodont Rest. 14, 16–22 (2024).
Zhang, Y., Vardhaman, S., Rodrigues, C. S. & Lawn, B. R. A critical review of dental lithia-based glass–ceramics. J. Dent. Res. 102, 245–253 (2023).
Edelhoff, D., Erdelt, K. J., Stawarczyk, B. & Liebermann, A. Pressable lithium disilicate ceramic versus CAD/CAM resin composite restorations in patients with moderate to severe tooth wear: clinical observations up to 13 years. J. Esthet Restor. Dent. 35, 116–128 (2023).
Pyo, S. W., Kim, D. J., Han, J. S. & Yeo, I. S. L. Ceramic materials and technologies applied to digital works in implant-supported restorative dentistry. Materials 13, 1964 (2020).
Ji, B., Alrayes, A. A., Zhao, J., Feng, Y. & Shen, Z. Grinding and Polishing efficiency of a novel self-glazed zirconia versus the conventional dry-pressed and sintered zirconia ceramics. Adv. Appl. Ceram. 118, 46–55 (2019).
Yuki, I. et al. Dry precision Polishing of dental composite resin: development of sodium alginate bonded mounted wheel. J. Prosthodont. Res. 62 (6), 318–323 (2016).
Mokhtar, A. G., Hussein, G. & Wahsh, M. Effect of different surface treatments on bond strength of resin cement with lithium silicate Ceramics, Al-Azhar. J. Dent. Sci. 27, 47–57 (2024).
Cunha, W. et al. Surface modification of zirconia dental implants by laser texturing. Lasers Med. Sci. 37, 1–17 (2022).
Loh, Y. M. et al. A novel magnetic field assisted automatic batch Polishing method for dental ceramic crowns. Ceram. Int. 49, 26540–26547 (2023).
Wu, Z. et al. Research on Polishing aluminum alloy optical elements with a new solid flexible Bonnet tool. J. Manuf. Process. 103, 168–180 (2023).
Cao, Z. C., Wang, M., Yan, S., Zhao, C. & Liu, H. Surface integrity and material removal mechanism in fluid jet Polishing of optical glass. J. Mater. Process. Technol. 311, 117798 (2023).
Amir, M. et al. Development of magnetic nanoparticle based nanoabrasives for magnetorheological finishing process and all their variants. Ceram. Int. 49, 6254–6261 (2023).
Li, M. et al. Adaptive shearing-gradient thickening Polishing (AS-GTP) and subsurface damage Inhibition. Int. J. Mach. Tools Manuf. 160, 103651 (2021).
Li, M., Lyu, B., Yuan, J., Dong, C. & Dai, W. Shear-thickening Polishing method. Int. J. Mach. Tools Manuf. 94, 88–99 (2015).
Gürgen, S. & Sert, A. Polishing operation of a steel bar in a shear thickening fluid medium. Compos. B Eng. 175, 107127 (2019).
Span, J., Koshy, P., Klocke, F., Müller, S. & Coelho, R. Dynamic jamming in dense suspensions: surface finishing and edge honing applications. CIRP Ann. 66, 321–324 (2017).
Shao, Q. et al. Shear thickening Polishing of the concave surface of high-temperature nickel-based alloy turbine blade. J. Mater. Res. Technol. 11, 72–84 (2021).
Nguyen, D. N., Lyu, H. A. & Duong, C. T. Simulation study on Polishing of gear surfaces in non-Newtonian fluid. Sci. Technol. Developm J. Eng. Technol. 3, 443–451 (2020).
Lv, D. et al. Analysis of abrasives on cutting edge Preparation by drag finishing. Int. J. Adv. Manuf. Tech. 119.5, 3583–3594 (2022).
Azami, A. et al. A new theoretical model for surface roughness prediction in rotational abrasive finishing process. Wear 524, 204772 (2023).
Acknowledgements
The authors would sincerely thank the reviewers for their very professional suggestions on this work.
Funding
The research work was funded by the Natural Science Foundation of Zhejiang (No. JXSQY26E050002), and the Jiaxing’s Key Research and Development Plan Projects (No. 2025AC013).
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Contributions
Conceptualization, X.D.; investigation and writing, X.D., L.Z. and J.W.; software, X.D. and L.Z.; writing—review and editing, Z.Z., L.Z. and J.W.; visualization, Z.Z. and Z.Z.; funding acquisition, X.D., and Z.Z. All authors have read and agreed to the published version of the manuscript.
Corresponding author
Ethics declarations
Competing interests
The authors declare no competing interests.
Additional information
Publisher’s note
Springer Nature remains neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institutional affiliations.
Supplementary Information
Below is the link to the electronic supplementary material.
Rights and permissions
Open Access This article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License, which permits any non-commercial use, sharing, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons licence, and indicate if you modified the licensed material. You do not have permission under this licence to share adapted material derived from this article or parts of it. The images or other third party material in this article are included in the article’s Creative Commons licence, unless indicated otherwise in a credit line to the material. If material is not included in the article’s Creative Commons licence and your intended use is not permitted by statutory regulation or exceeds the permitted use, you will need to obtain permission directly from the copyright holder. To view a copy of this licence, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/.
About this article
Cite this article
Zhou, Z., Zhu, L., Wang, J. et al. Polishing dental ceramics using shear-thickening slurry. Sci Rep (2026). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-026-38788-x
Received:
Accepted:
Published:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-026-38788-x
