SBIR-STTR Award

Development of a high performance electric powered portable dental unit is an important element of a strategy to improve the mobility, deployability, and effectiveness of the United States military mobile dental corps. Of prime importance are: lighter weight, smaller cube, and lower power consumption. This project will define the requirements for a portable unit, survey the marketplace for candidate light-weight, small cube, low power components, and build a prototype to demonstrate the feasibility and value of such a product.

Benefits:
There are thousands of people in remote areas of the world that could receive dentalcare with this type unit. This type unit would make it easier for dentists to provide care in: nursing homes, hospitals, homes, prisons, and other institutions.

Phase I established the feasibility of producing a field dental unit based on electric hand piece technology. During the conduct of Phase I potential Suppliers were identified that could further reduce the cube, weight, and power needs of such a system. The Phase I program indicated that the cube, weight, and power requirements of such a system can be reduce by up to 60% over the system presently in the inventory. Phase II is focused on realizing the additional improvements and fabricating 3 Prototype Systems for test and evaluation. In addition, solar Power will be evaluated.

Benefits:
The reduce cube, weight, and power consumption will improve the mobility of the military field dentists and, with the solar power, eliminate the need for a generator

Keywords:
Portable Dentistry Mobile Dentistry Electric Dental Hand Piece