Applications of X-ray fluorescence analysis (XRF) to dental and medical specimens

Human tissues contain many kinds of minerals and trace essential elements that act as catalytic or structural components of large biochemical molecules. In addition, various metallic and inorganic materials are used in dental and medical materials and devices. In the dental and medical fields, specimens that are wet and/or have low heat resistance are often requested for elemental analysis. Therefore, a rapid and non-destructive method of elemental analysis is required. X-ray fluorescence analysis (XRF) provides useful elemental information about specimens without causing specimen damage or requiring extra specimen preparations. In this paper, an outline of the XRF apparatus and applications of XRF to hard and soft dental and medical specimen tissues are presented, and dental materials are reviewed. (C) 2014 Japanese Association for Dental Science. Published by Elsevier Ltd.