ORIGINAL RESEARCH article
Front. Mater.
Sec. Ceramics and Glass
Chairside Finishing and Polishing of Modern Dental Ceramics: Material-Specific Variations in Surface Roughness
Provisionally accepted
- College of Dentistry, King Saud University, Riyadh, Saudi Arabia
Select one of your emails
You have multiple emails registered with Frontiers:
Notify me on publication
Please enter your email address:
If you already have an account, please login
You don't have a Frontiers account ? You can register here
Aim: This study examines the effects of chairside finishing and polishing on the surface roughness (SR) of zirconia (ZR), lithium disilicate (LD), and hybrid ceramics (HC) to identify material-specific variations and determine optimal clinical protocols for smooth, durable, and esthetic ceramic surfaces. Methodology: Three modern dental ceramics Zr (IPS e.max® ZirCAD), LD (IPS e.max® CAD), and HC (Vita Enamic®) were used to create 135 disc-shaped specimens. Each specimen (10mm diameter×2mm) was either glazed or finished polished following the protocols set for study. A Profilometer evaluated SR of the two surfaces in micrometers (μm), while the surface topography was examined using scanning-electron-microscope (SEM). Using SPSS, ANOVA and post-hoc multi-comparison tests were used for statistical analysis. Results: One-way ANOVA revealed significant differences among groups (p<0.05). For Zr, the glazed specimens exhibited the highest SR (p=0.000), while OptraFine® and Diasynt® produced smoother surfaces with no significant difference between them (p=0.226). In the LD group, Diasynt® showed significantly higher roughness compared with both OptraFine® and glazed specimens (p=0.000), whereas OptraFine® and glazed groups did not differ significantly (p=0.060). For HC, Diasynt® produced the highest roughness, followed by glazing, with OptraFine® yielding the smoothest surfacesFor HC, Diasynt® generated significantly higher roughness than OptraFine® (p=0.000), while glazing produced intermediate values. Overall, OptraFine® consistently yielded the lowest surface roughness across all materials, with LD exhibiting the smoothest surfaces (0.119±0.031µm). Conclusion: SR of CAD/CAM ceramics was influenced by both material type and finishing method. OptraFine® consistently produced the smoothest surfaces. LD was the smoothest material, and ZR benefited more from polishing than glazing. Material-specific finishing is essential for optimal smoothness, esthetics, and durability.
Keywords: CAD/CAM restorations, Chairside polishing, Dental Ceramics, Hybrid ceramics, Lithium disilicate, Polishing systems, Zirconia
Received: 12 Nov 2025; Accepted: 10 Dec 2025.
Copyright: © 2025 Alrabiah, Binrayes, Alsayed, Althumairy and Habib. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.
* Correspondence: Syed Rashid Habib
Disclaimer: All claims expressed in this article are solely those of the authors and do not necessarily represent those of their affiliated organizations, or those of the publisher, the editors and the reviewers. Any product that may be evaluated in this article or claim that may be made by its manufacturer is not guaranteed or endorsed by the publisher.