Raman hypermapping of human teeth: Analysis and statistical approaches

Raman spectroscopy has found widespread use helping to understand structure and composition as related to enamel and dentin chemical resistance, mechanical properties, protein alteration, and tooth diseases. The morphology, chemical composition and structure of enamel are the main factors determining tooth resistance to carious and non-carious lesions. We have investigated the teeth with hypoplasia lesions of different severity as well as eroded and intact teeth. In order to investigate the local structural variations of tooth tissues, we performed hyper-spectral Raman mapping. The results substantiate the structural variations in intact and affected teeth as the degree of bioapatite disorder. The changes observed in the degree of mineralization and their manifestation through the linewidth and peak position of P-0 stretching vibration at 960 cm−1 and C-H stretching vibration at 2940 cm−1 are a sensitive probes of the local structural environment.