As you all know, I have the distinct pleasure of filming the technical training DVDs for National Lab Network. It takes me on location to film at all kinds of laboratories and manufacturers  The education I receive simultaneously is one of the true rewards of this job. Recently, we had planned on filming a manually aided design and manually aided milling technique (MAD/MAM versus CAD/CAM) using the Zirkon Zahn system. Allessandro Cucchiaro, MDT, and the team in Atlanta had a bit of a surprise for us. We did discuss manual milling machines, copings, custom abutments and bridge frameworks up to 16 units as a single milled piece. What we had not discussed and I was not prepared to see was the milling of the full occlusal morphology and contours in Zirconia!

Sandy (he goes by this shortened version of his name) had prepared a full mouth U/L reconstruction case on implants that had the full occlusal morphology and lingual surfaces milled and then stained in Zirconia (both at the unsintered and finished stages). Unbelievable. This out-of-the-box thinking had required him to mill full coverage Zirconia crowns to cover the posterior abutments. The anteriors and bicuspid had been designed with a veneer like facial preparation to accept building and contouring of porcelain. The staining and build up of the gingival tissue portion looked awesome as well. Upon completion, this case looked great.

The point here is a simple one.

We live at a time when change comes at us at the speed of thought. Cell phones that look cooler than Star Trek communicators, 60-inch flat screen televisions that hug the wall, CAD/CAM, laser and other prototyping advancements that morph our idea of what dental technology is, are here upon us, right now. Yet, it still takes the human mind to observe, evaluate, design and create these and other innovative uses of these products and applications.

We will see changes in the next few years in our profession and industry that were nearly unimaginable a few years ago. I picture the dental technician of tomorrow (even today) as holding a computer mouse in his or her hand rather than a wax dripper. Rather than mouse, I should say Human Interface Device because it may be some other form of Nintendo Wii-like device that we use to design restorations (see sensable.com ). Shipping is nearly instantaneous at the speed of light. Your only delay is the file download time when you send in the case. All we need is the teleporter from Star Trek lore to get the restorations back just as fast.

In fact, necessity is the mother of invention.  The transporter for the show was actually created because the cost and time to film landings and take off for the Enterprise was time and cost prohibitive. They had decided to use a landing pod, but it was not ready in time for the first episode. Hence the crazy idea of dematerializing folks and turning them into energy.

"Computers are incredibly fast, accurate, and stupid. Human beings are incredibly slow, inaccurate, and brilliant. Together they are powerful beyond imagination." -Albert Einstein

Mark Murphy is a featured presenter for National Dental Network and President of the National Lab Network.  He served as the VP of Operations for DTI until taking a position as Director of Professional Relations at The Pankey Institute until taking on his current role.  Mark is active on the NADL'­s Business Management Committee and is the Dentist Representative to the Identalloy Council.