The resistance of superficially sealed enamel to wear and carious attack in vitro.

The resistance to wear and carious attack has been investigated in vitro for enamel that has been subjected to several stages of the sealing procedure: etching, etching and remineralization in whole saliva and etching followed by sealing. After partial mechanical removal of the sealant, the remaining surface enamel proved to be resistant to carious attack as long as the resin tags were present. An estimation is made of the thickness of the affected layer. Pretreatment with monofluorophosphate has proved to influence the extent of the histological changes due to etching. A discussion on these phenomena is given.