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Breaking the rules: tooth whitening by means of a reducing agent

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Abstract

Objectives

It is widely accepted that current tooth whitening treatment effect is based on the oxidizing action of peroxides, even if the mechanism of action remains still unclear. Treatments are claimed to be safe, but several secondary effects have been described, since long application times and high concentrations are needed. A faster whitening ingredient which permits the use of lower concentrations and shorter application times could potentially overcome this problem. In this work, a different approach based on a reducing agent, sodium metabisulfite (MBS), is explored.

Materials and methods

The reaction between tannic acid (TA) with carbamide peroxide (CP), MBS, and potassium persulfate (PS), as an oxidizing agent, was monitored for 48 hours by measuring its absorbance, comparing their different whitening effects. The reduction process between TA and MBS was confirmed by cyclic voltammetry. An in vitro test was used to observe if MBS whitens also stained teeth.

Results

It is shown that MBS bleaching effect is faster and higher than CP’s effect over time. PS produced a darkening effect after the 3rd hour because of the strong absorbance of the oxidation metabolite. Cyclic voltammetry showed a progressive increase in the intensity of the TA anodic peak when MBS was present, demonstrating that a reduction is taking place. In vitro, MBS showed a faster whitening performance than CP, using lower concentrations.

Conclusions

Using a TA solution as a staining model, it was possible to show that MBS has a visible bleaching effect through a reduction reaction, faster than CP, both in solution and in vitro. Low concentrations of MBS are effective in whitening.

Clinical significance

This work shows MBS as a promising candidate to develop novel whitening treatments, which is acting by reducing mechanism instead of oxidation.

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Acknowledgments

This work was supported by the Spanish Project CTM 2015-65414-C2-1-R and by the Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona with the “Personal d'Investigació en Formació” scholarship.

Funding

The work was supported by the Spanish Project CTM 2015-65414-C2-1-R and by the Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona with the “Personal d'Investigació en Formació” scholarship.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. GTS Research Group, Department of Chemistry, Faculty of Science, Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona, 08193, Bellaterra, Spain

    Clara Babot Marquillas, Manuel Valiente Malmagro & Maria-Jesús Sánchez-Martín

  2. División Electroquímica Aplicada, Instituto de Investigaciones en Ciencia y Tecnología de Materiales (INTEMA-CONICET-UNMdP), 10850 Av. Colón, Mar del Plata, Argentina

    Raúl Procaccini

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  1. Clara Babot Marquillas
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Correspondence to Maria-Jesús Sánchez-Martín.

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Clara Babot Marquillas declares that she has no conflict of interest. Maria-Jesús Sánchez-Martín declares that she has no conflict of interest. Raúl Procaccini declares that he has no conflict of interest. Manuel Valiente Malmagro declares that he has no conflict of interest.

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Marquillas, C.B., Procaccini, R., Malmagro, M.V. et al. Breaking the rules: tooth whitening by means of a reducing agent. Clin Oral Invest 24, 2773–2779 (2020). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00784-019-03140-3

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