A trial to understand Dental Research Process, that can help assistant researchers and research assistants in Dental fields to go into their profession more and more. 1- Skills 2- Ideas 3- Relations 4- Mentor 5- Funding

1. A trial to understand and
how to connect with the
scientific community Abroad
Mohamed Abdelfattah Galal
Assistant Researcher
Oral Medicine & Surgery Dep.
Dent. Res. Div., NRC

2. 1. Dental Research ?!#$%^&*!?=
Consider it an Introduction
1. The process of Dental Research (My own point
of view)
1- Skills
2- New Ideas
3- Mentor (Supervisor)
4- RELATIONS & Connecting people Abroad
5- Funding
2. Scholarships and Grants. Another point of view.
1- Types
2- New places
3- Any chance to improve your profession

3. 1. Since My first presence in NRC, I was referred
to “Basic Medical Sciences Dep.”, where I
began to ask:
“What is my Job Description?”
2. During my long Masters’ process between
academic Oral Pathology, then Oral Surgery and
Lastly Oral Radiology, within the NRC and the
postgraduate process, which is considered as a
research issue and profession as well, so I had
my own panoramic view- that I want to share
with you.
3. Our Dental Research Division is a child division
at NRC, since 2009. (7-8 years old), with about
250 members.
We have a potential if dealt with well, >>>>>>>>>

5.  To research is to investigate systemically.
(French origin word)
 Research comprises “creative work undertaken
on a systematic basis to increase the stock of
knowledge – including knowledge of humankind,
culture and society – and the use of this stock to
innovate new applications.”

6.  It is used to:
1. Establish or confirm facts.
2. Reaffirm the results of previous work.
3. Solve new or existing problems.
4. Support theorems, or develop
new theories.

7.  Medical and Dental Research means research
and/or training primarily aimed at understanding
or treating a human disease or health condition.
 It is a part from Medical Research, which has its
basic research parts as well as its applied part
(clinical research).
 Research in all its forms—government-sponsored,
academic, independent, product development—
supports the intellectual underpinning of the
dental profession as a whole.

8.  1800s: the idea of removing only the diseased portion of the
tooth and filling it in was developed. The original material was
lead, which soon gave way to mercury amalgam.
 1890s: Louis Pasteur established microbiology, then
understanding that dental Caries and periodontal disease, are
really infectious diseases, changed our ways to treat them >>>
strategies of prevention.
 Early 1900s: Nutrition was linked to health promotion (ie, Lack
of Vitamin C causes scurvy and influences gingival health).
 1844: Horace Wells, a dentist from Connecticut, discovered that
nitrous oxide could be used as an anesthesia and did several
extractions in his clinic.
 1905:Alfred Einhorn, a German chemist, developed a local
anesthetic, named later: Novocain.
 1908: Greene Vardiman Black, published Operative Dentistry.
He also developed techniques for filling teeth, standardized
operative procedures and instrumentation, developed an
improved amalgam, and pioneered the use of visual aids for
teaching dentistry.

9.  1926: Geis Report, sponsored by the Carnegie Foundation,
advanced modern university-based dental education in the
United States and Western Europe.
 1930s: The benefits of fluoride were discovered.
 1937: The first Vitallium dental screw implant was
inserted in 1937 by Alvin Strock.
 1940s: clinical trials were invented, with one of the first
being conducted on the fluoridation of drinking water.
 1945: The water fluoridation era began, when Newburgh,
New York, and Grand Rapids, Michigan, began adding
sodium fluoride to their public water systems.
 1948: Federal funding for dental research was
established. President Harry S. Truman signed a
Congressional bill to formally establish the National
Institute of Dental Research.(NIDR)

10.  1949: Adhesive bonding and polymer chemistry were
developed, when Oskar Haggar, a Swiss chemist, developed
the first system of bonding acrylic resin to dentin.
 1955: Michael Buonocore described the acid-etch
technique, a simple method to increase the adhesion of
acrylic fillings to enamel.
 1957: John Borden introduced a high-speed, air-driven,
contra-angle handpiece. (commercial success)
 1962: Rafael Bowen developed Bis-GMA.
 1965: Professor P.I. Brånemark placed his first dental
implant, to represent his discovery: osseointegration.
 1995: The Institute of Medicine published Dental
Education at the Crossroads, a major call for reform in
dental education and the practice of dentistry.
 1998: The NIDR organization changed its name in 1998 to
the National Institute of Dental and Craniofacial Research
(NIDCR)

11.  Host response to infection and inflammation is
better understood.
 The link between oral and systemic disease is
now recognized. In 2000, the US Surgeon General
released Oral Health in America.
 The digital revolution occurred. Computers and
telephones, digital radiography, CAD/CAM
chairside restorations, intraoral imaging,
computerized patient records, and practice
management software. Additionally, high-tech
products—such as high-intensity curing lights,
caries diagnostic tools based on laser
evaluations, and others—continue to change
dentistry at a rapid pace.

12.  Health promotion
 Risk assessment
 Disease prevention
 Treatment planning
 Therapeutics
 Restorative materials
 Predictable clinical
outcomes
 “Scientists—whether in academic
institutions, industry, or private practice—
will understand the problems general
dentists or specialists are facing on a day-to-
day basis and develop approaches for how
they can be solved, or how treatments can
be developed to alleviate diseases or
conditions,”

14.  “You need a pipeline of researchers,” says
Fox, DMD, DMSc, executive director of the
International and American Associations for
Dental Research (IADR/ AADR). “That means
encouraging students to pursue academic
and dental research careers.”

15. (My own point of view)

16.  Another definition of research is given by
Creswell who states that - "Research is a
process of steps used to collect and analyze
information to increase our understanding of
a topic or issue".
 It consists of three steps:
1. Pose a question.
2. Collect data to answer the question.
3. Present an answer to the question.

17. 1- Skills
2- New
Ideas
3- Relations4- Mentor
5- Funding

18. 5 Advices to pass the
neck of the bottle

19. 1- Skills

20.  By skills we mean “the ability to use one’s
knowledge effectively and readily in
execution or performance”

21.  This is a curriculum that
is studied in most
colleges, in Egypt &
Abroad.
 Astonishingly, it is
missed in graduation
curricula of dentistry in
Egypt, and sometimes
missed also in
postgraduate curricula.
 It is also, our profession

22. Languages by total number of speakers

25. Three goals, however, have
persisted over the years: to keep
up with current literature, to
impact clinical practice, and to
teach critical reading skills.

26. (Publishing any idea: Patent,
editorial, review, proposal,
results of a research,
teamwork writing)

30.  In our modern Arab culture, we miss having
alternatives. Although skillful people around
us are the people of alternatives.
 Please, put in your mind during keeping
trying, having a “PLAN B”, “PLAN C” and
“PLAN D”, especially in Egypt.
 During working these plans can be modified,
even to reach “PLAN Z”

33.  “Ideas come from people, sometimes in a
discussion in a clinical setting; sometimes from
students, faculty, and staff; they definitely come
from practicing dentists all over the world; and
they also come from fields outside of dentistry.”
 “From the synthesis of ideas from chemists,
biologists, dentists, and others, a new idea is
born and a new way of thinking is developed,”
 “The most impressive breakthroughs in any areas
of humanity come at the interface between
different ways of thinking.”

34.  Scientists and their contributions
 Institutes and their facilities and devices
 Researchgate
 Academia
 LinkedIn

35.  Reviews in your specialty
 Open Accessed Journals
 Closed Journals and ways to
open.
 Facebook groups
 Accounts of Researchers on online
communities

36.  Databases:
 Pubmed
 Scopus
 ISI - Web of science
 Google scholar
 Egyptian Knowledge Bank
 Bibliometrics of papers

38.  Online Courses as an emerging good way to
know about new science fields.
 Some Events Put their open accessed
Lectures like workshops, Conferences, etc.

39. 1. Dental Nutrition.
2. Dental Laser.
3. Stem Cell Research.
4. Dental Genetics.
5. Bioinformatics.
6. Medical & Dental Informatics: In Silico Studies.
7. Dental Management and Economics.
8. Neurosciences.
9. Nanodentistry and New Biomaterials.
10. Dental Forensics and Anthropology.
11. Public Health and Epidemiology
12. Dental Sports – Dental Tourism – any other Interdisciplinary.
13. Experimental Animal Studies.
14. Evidence Based Dentistry & RCTs.
15. Oral Cancer & Oncology.
16. Oral Diagnosis new tools.

41.  Hard Laser
 Soft Laser
 Biostimulation by
Low Level Laser

43.  Genome association
studies

44.  The identification
of relevant
biomarkers found
in saliva.

45.  In-silico Studies

48.  nanosensors
Tooth tatoo sensor

50.  The emphasis is on
prevention in
Egypt is in a mess.
 Early Detection of
Oral Diseases.
 Even Awareness of
Dental Staff,
about usual oral
diseases.

51.  Issues we care about and don’t know it can
be scientific:
 Sports Dentistry
 Dental Tourism
 Sleep Dentistry
 Any other Interdisciplinary.

52. 1. Debate around
Importance of
Experimental
Animal Studies
(Zoologists still
using Micro CT and
Micro MRI, are
those in vain, Just
a debate that will
not be ending very
soon as some of us
think)

53.  Evidence Based
Dentistry and
Medicine (huge
amount of resesarch
published (esp.
Randomized Clinical
Trials RCTs on humans)
 => Publishing Data
Bases online
 => Meta Analysis of
them after apprasial
 => Forest Plot

54. 1. Prevalence
2. Causes
3. Diagnosis
4. Therapy
5. Prognosis

56.  Experience + A precious idea => A Proposal

57. 1. Dental Hypothesis
2. Presence of some proposals online
3. Patents

58.  Publish a review, or even a letter to the editor.
 Publish a research paper with someone older.
 Emailing a foreigner researcher to work
together.
 Submit to a Scientific Project Call
 Estabishing a research group to your new idea
 Don’t give up your own ideas to despair because
of people’s suggestions about the reality.
 Try it yourself, either with a colleague who
admires it or even alone.
 Take care without panic, in order not to be
stolen.

62.  PhD studies may be either:
1. Thesis Dissertation and Defense
2. Publishing 3 papers.

63. Extract your Jinni
from the Lamp

65. 1. Education Professors
2. Education Colleagues
(Graduation, Masters)
3. Work Colleagues
4. Conferences, Workshops & Courses
5. Online Connections

66.  In the past few decades there has been much
focus on innovation and collaboration.
 Innovation is deemed to be the key to the
advancement of various world economies and
the solution of the many challenges faced in
today’s world.
 Because of the increasing complexity of the
problems faced in many areas, collaboration of
people with many different skills and
backgrounds, as well as different racial, ethnic
and cultural groups.
 Diverse Groups Collaborators may have
complementary knowledge bases that facilitate
the development of creative solutions.
 This is a very reasonable assumption.

67.  A new trend in Education, where teachers
became capable to provide adequate and
innovative teaching in Science, Technology,
Engineering and Mathematics subjects. It began
because of decreased percentage of students
pursuing STEM degrees.
 In the US:
 Bachelors: 24% in 1985 to 18% in 2009.
 Master’s: 18% in 1985 to 14% in 2009.
 Doctorate: More foreign-born students from 26% to
46% at 2006.
 Demand on STEM workers increased because Non-
STEM Employers also demand STEM graduates.

68.  Each consists of:
 A lead researcher
 A group of students
 Possibly postdoctoral fellows, and technical staff.
 The members do not necessarily work on the same
research study.
 What defines the group are the area of study, and
most importantly, the lead researcher, who is often a
professor at a research university.
 Research groups can have different structures:
either loosely or tightly organized.

69.  The students and postdoctoral fellows associated with
all of the lead researcher’s projects work together in
shared laboratory space. (center of action)
 These groups meet on a regular basis to:
1. Report on the progress of their research
2. Share knowledge and skills
3. Critique one another’s research.
4. They may also engage in the collective reading and critique of
the literature in journal clubs.
 The proximity of students, postdoctoral fellows, and
the lead researcher in the laboratory provides for
informal discussions.
 They also engage in social activities together, such as
cookouts and holiday and birthday parties.

70.  The lead researcher serves as the center of
action.
 In this type of group, students work
individually; for example, they do
fieldwork, bring samples back to the
laboratory where they are analyzed on
communal instruments to quantify the data,
and then work individually on their analysis.
 Rather than having group meetings, the lead
researcher will meet with students
individually to discuss their progress and
provide guidance.

71. 1. The way research is done in the scientific domain may
determine whether a group is tightly or loosely
organized.
 The laboratory-based research groups like: microbiology
and environmental engineering (biological processes)—
were tightly organized, whereas the geochemistry group
(individual fieldwork) and the hydrology group (the use of
computer modeling) were loosely organized.
2. It also appears that how tightly or loosely organized the
group is may depend on the personal characteristics of
the lead researcher, with an additional effect on the
structure by the personal characteristics of the members.
 Students in the tightly organized groups
interacted more with other students than those
in loosely organized groups.

72.  Stucky (2005), found that students learned skills such as:
1. Specific research methods.
2. How to use complex equipment.
3. How to document and disseminate their work.
4. The language and culture of the research group.
 Much of this learning occurred when students encountered:
1. Problems associated with equipment, materials, and
instruments.
2. Lack of relevant background knowledge.
3. Problems with strategies or tactics that inhibit performance
of a system.
 These problems were addressed in:
1. One-on-one conversations with peers or with the research
director
2. As part of the regular group meetings, which also provided
opportunities for students to gain experience presenting their
work to other researchers.

74.  In the Research
Project, students
have the opportunity
to study an area of
interest in depth.
 They use their
creativity and
initiative, while
developing the
research and
presentation skills
they will need in
further study or
work.

76.  Mentorship is a relationship in which a more
experienced or more knowledgeable person
helps to guide a less experienced or less
knowledgeable person. The mentor may be
older or younger, but have a certain area of
expertise. It is a learning and development
partnership between someone with vast
experience and someone who wants to learn.

77.  Supervisor finding
 Supervisor invasion
 The social Media for Scientists (researchgate,
Academia and LinkedIn)
 Collaboration between Institutes and
Professors.
 The Research Community

78.  Email of your Institute
 CV and Cover Letter

79.  Scientific research is a widely used criterion
for judging the standing of an academic
institution, such as business schools, but
some argue that such is an inaccurate
assessment of the institution, because the
quality of research does not tell about the
quality of teaching (these do not necessarily
correlate totally).

80. “ Scientific research is funded by public
authorities, by charitable organizations and
by private groups, including many
companies.” (Wikipedia/Research)

81. To Be
Continued