RESUMO
El esmalte dental es el tejido duro más mineralizado del cuerpo humano. En este trabajo se estudiaron las propiedades mecánicas fundamentales de este tejido para terceros molares de pacientes jóvenes colombianos. Se establecieron la dureza, la tenacidad a la fractura aparente y la fragilidad del esmalte dental en función de la profundidad a partir de la superficie oclusal mediante técnicas de medición de microindentación. Se encontró que las mediciones de dureza son altamente dependientes de la carga utilizada, hallándose que para valores de carga pequeños las huellas alcanzan a representar la dureza de un solo prisma de hidroxiapatita, mientras que para valores altos de carga las huellas abarcan un número de prismas suficientes para estimar la dureza general del esmalte. En términos generales los valores de las propiedades medidas son semejantes a los encontrados en estudios realizados en pacientes jóvenes norteamericanos, evidenciando que estas propiedades del esmalte son independientes de las características raciales o étnicas para pacientes jóvenes, lo cual no es necesariamente extensible al comportamiento de estos tejidos en pacientes mayores.
Dental enamel is one of the hardest and most mineralized tissues of the human body. This work studied the main mechanical properties of this hard tissue for third molars obtained from young Colombian patients. The hardness, apparent fracture toughness and brittleness of enamel were measured as a function of distance from the occlusal surface to the Dental Enamel Junction (DEJ) by means of microndentation techniques. It was found that the hardness measurements are highly dependent on the indentation load, with high values of hardness found when low loads were used. This behavior is explained by the size of the indentations which approached the size of single hydroxyapatite prisms for low load values, while for high load values the size of the indents covered several prisms. Overall, the mechanical properties measured on the enamel from young Colombians are close to the properties reported in the literature for young North American patients. Whether these similarities among young patients persist for older patients deserves further investigation.
RESUMO
MHC class II alleles and haplotypes were determined from unrelated individuals and families of the Arhuaco (n = 107), Kogi (n = 42), Arsario (n = 18), and Wayú (n = 88) tribes located in the northern part of Colombia. Class II DRB, DQA1, and DQB1 alleles were determined by PCR-SSO and PCR-RFLP based methods. Four haplotypes, [DRB1*0407, DRB4*0101, DQA1*03, DQB1*0302]; [DRB1*0403, DRB4*0101, DQA1*03, DQB1*0302]; [DRB1*1402/1406, DRB3*0101, DQA1*0501, DQB1*0301]; and [DRB1*0802, DQA1*0401, DQB1*0402], were observed among these four tribes. In addition to these haplotypes, the Wayú Indians showed a frequency of 21.3% for the [DRB1*1602, DRB5*02, DQA1*0501, DQB1*0301] haplotype, 13.1% for the [DRB1*0411, DRB4*0101, DQA1*03, DQB1*0302] haplotype, and 8.1% for the [DRB1*0411, DRB4*0101, DQA1*03, DQB1*0402] haplotype. Red cell antigen typing was used to calculate genetic admixture. The Kogi and Arsario showed no genetic admixture while the Arhuaco tribe showed admixture with genes of African origin and the Wayú showed admixture with Caucasians as well as genes of African origin. These findings were confirmed by the MHC class II allele and haplotype data obtained, as alleles and haplotypes of Caucasian and African origin were detected in the Wayú and Arhuaco and not in the Kogi or Arsario. These studies will be important in disease association and transplantation studies for Amerindian and colombian populations and for correlating genetic traits with the anthropologic and linguistic data available in order to better understand the Amerindian populations.