Optical 3-D dental scanner wins VISION 2011 prize

Anyone who has been to the dentist can testify to the fact that undergoing root canal and crown therapy or being measured up for dentures isn't the most pleasant of experiences.

So I was particularly pleased to see that a dental scanner that promises to take the misery out of such a process has won this year's EUR5000 top prize at the VISION 2011 trade fair in Stuttgart.

Today, creating a model of the mouth is a fairly primitive procedure. Teeth are cast using an impression compound that is placed in the mouth of a patient and left to set. A resulting plaster model of the teeth is then prepared from the impression, after which the model is digitized using a stationary scanner. In a final step, dentures can be produced from the model with the aid of a CAD/CAM system.

But all of that is set to change thanks to the new system developed by the prize-winning engineers at the Austrian Institute of Technology (AIT), which will obviate the need for dentists to make dental impressions of the mouth, making the entire process less unpleasant and time-consuming.

The AIT system itself is based on a small 3-D scanner that is placed inside the mouth. The scanner illuminates the mouth with light after which two cameras capture images in real time. A data file -- which previously had to be created in the numerous stages described earlier -- is then created and transmitted to a PC over a USB port where the 3-D model can be visualized (see video).


According to the AIT researchers, a complete jaw arch can be measured in 3 to 5 minutes, and the accuracy of the completed model is to within 20 microns.

The stereo method for measuring the location of the teeth and the design of the scanner have been patented jointly by Klagenfurt am Worthersee-based startup a.tron3d and AIT. But those outside the dental industry can license the stereo software on an individual basis -- as PC software, as a program library for Windows and Linux, or as firmware for embedded devices such as smart cameras.

For its part, a.tron3d -- which holds the exclusive rights for the dental industry -- plans to release the scanner, called the Bluescan-I, by March 2012.

Sadly, that'll not be of too much use to me since I have already had much dental treatment on my teeth using the older, more primitive measurement method. But the good news is that it will certainly help new patients who will no longer have to experience almost choking when their mouths are full of that rather horrid tasting impression compound.

A booming business?

If you watch the daily news on television, you might be forgiven for thinking that Europe is in a complete financial and economic mess. But you wouldn't think so if you attended last week's VISION Show 2011. For there, a record number of companies and attendees filled the halls of the Messe Stuttgart, proving that despite the problems that might face the folks in the Eurozone, the vision industry still appears to be booming.

That's right. There's no doubt about it. This year's VISION 2011 show in Stuttgart, Germany was an unparalleled success. More than 350 exhibitors attended the show, an increase of 8.4% on the number that were there last year. And from the number of interested parties that were walking the aisles of the show, I'd say that interest in the industry is as high as it has ever been.

But what is really going on in the market? Is it booming or stagnant? To find out, I attended the annual networking reception held in the halls of the show, where Gregory Hollows from the Automated Imaging Association (AIA, United States) was joined by Sung-ho Huh from the Korean Machine Vision Association (KMVA) and Isabel Yang from the China Machine Vision Union (CMVU) to present the state of the market in their various countries.

Out from the crisis of 2009 which saw the vision systems market down 20%, Gregory Hollows -- the vice-chair of the AIA board of directors -- said that the vision systems market in the US had rallied, experiencing 4% growth this year. Not bad news on the US front, then.

Korea's Sung-ho Huh had pretty much the same to say. According to him, the Korean market is in pretty good shape, too, and had experienced growth of 5% this year. Of course, as one might expect, the picture from China was even rosier, with Isabel Yang telling us that the vision system market in China had experienced a growth rate of around 10%.

After the reception, of course, came the analysis. A few folks that I spoke to were somewhat worried about prospects for the market next year. While they had a reasonable 2011, they weren't expecting things to stay as positive in 2012. Others were interested to know how they might enter the more lucrative Asian marketplace, which they saw as a prime opportunity worth exploiting. And there were a few, I must admit, that didn't believe that the Chinese economy was quite as rosy as it was painted, citing a number of enormous factory openings there that had been put on hold due to weak demand in the West.

Interpreting market figures from any of the above organizations, no matter how carefully they are researched, might never provide a true indication of how vibrant the vision systems marketplace is. Perhaps the only true market indicator could be found by counting the number of companies and attendees at VISION 2011 itself. If that's anything to go by, I'd say that the vision business is still in pretty good shape!