Ortho Research

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I try to do some ortho research during this summer before I enter dental school. but when I looked through some dental school's webpage, all I see is some dental terminology I don't know. so can Anyone provide some ortho research hot topics I can possibly do ?
thanks

 

[delicious]

I try to do some ortho research during this summer before I enter dental school. but when I looked through some dental school's webpage, all I see is some dental terminology I don't know. so can Anyone provide some ortho research hot topics I can possibly do ?
thanks

..., no offense, but your screen name sucks. But seriously, ..., I feel that if you got involved in an ortho research project at this point you would be in over your head. What do you really know about dentistry or ortho ... ? Probably not that much - that's why you don't understand the terminology. If you got involved you would just be doing some grunt work, maybe measuring one or two things all day long. If you really want to get involved in dental research now, try and get involved in more basic science research. There, you might be able to use some of your past experiences and skills from college. Good Luck ... !!!!!!

 

[Austin1]

I usually dont post, but just read posts, but I have to comment. Why does everyone want to do ortho when they have not been exposed to it yet? I would wait and get your feet wet before you decided you were sold on it. It is one thing to see, and one thing to do. I wonder how many people would truely do ortho if you just got by financially. It is no offense to the people who have a love for it and have actually been exposed to it clinically.

 

[delicious]

I usually dont post, but just read posts, but I have to comment. Why does everyone want to do ortho when they have not been exposed to it yet? I would wait and get your feet wet before you decided you were sold on it. It is one thing to see, and one thing to do. I wonder how many people would truely do ortho if you just got by financially. It is no offense to the people who have a love for it and have actually been exposed to it clinically.

I fully agree with you Austin1. Level-headed third years that I know will even tell me that they don't know much about dentistry, and that they're still not sure about specialties.

..., don't worry about getting an ortho research project at this point. Trust me, when you apply to ortho they won't care what you did the summer before you started dental school. It's unnecessary. Besides, with a name like ... it's clear that you have the personality and creativity most ortho programs are looking for.

 

[Da ObtURator]

Everyone just SIMMMA DOWWWN NOWW!!

I think the original poster is actually on the right track.... if you know that you would like to specialize in ortho or endo, you know that research could be a benefit to have when time comes to apply. As an undergrad, I was involved in the highest quality of bench research working along PhD's and grad students from all over the world (we had a very diverse and interesting mix of researchers). One guy was creating a cDNA library for his masters project, another gal was performing in situ hybridization for her post-doc research project, another scientist was working on finding the retonoids that we may be exposed to and have caused severe malfornation in animals, as me, I had my own cell culturing and harvesting to do in order to study regulatory gene expression during development.

My point is that if a 3rd year undergrad student can study complex topics without "being way over his head" then I don't see why anyone who has graduated from college and soon will be enrolled in a doctoral program, can't do research. That is totally absurd. If you know how one commences with research, then you know that READING classical literature about your field of research and learning basic techniques such as pippetting, cell culturing, etc. will be the starting point. I doubt your PI will not want you trained and ready BEFORE starting rearch.

I am sure you all did not mean to discourage the original poster but I can't see any harm in approaching faculty during the summer before your first year and beginning to get the training needed to begin research. ADVICE: if you are truly interested in performing research, then call up your dental school research department (or visit if your near) and ask them about any openings in labs and if they do have openings, then let them know that you will be committed and will begin training this summer for X number of weeks/months. Make sure u read up on the lab before talking to them, as they suredly will ask why you are inquiring about their particular lab and what interests you about that type of research. MOST important is that you assure them that you are totally committed, hard working, and will be more than happy to read up on all the background literatare necessary to fully contribute.

I'm sure if you have the right intentions and determination, you can surely find a nice research position, GOOD LUCK!

 

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thanks Da ObtURator

I want to do reserach is just a way of killing summer ( I am jsut too poor to afford some fancy europe trip) compare to work in a mall, getting some research experience in the my potential specialized area will be a better choice. this is my initial purpose of this post.

I think I will email the head of the ortho department of my school, see if I can get a job. thanks all

 

[delicious]

...but I can't see any harm in approaching faculty during the summer before your first year and beginning to get the training needed to begin research.

No, there's no harm at all.

All I'm trying to say is that dental research isn't like the basic science research you described. First, dentistry itself is hard to learn from reading - you have to experience it to understand it. Second, especially with orthodontics research, it's mostly clinical. The OP won't be in a lab.

There's a lot to learn when being thrown into someone's mouth, and you'd have to be pretty lucky to get a mentor that's willing to hold your hand. So, IMO, I think you may end up doing something monotonous and not really learn a lot. I just feel that ortho research may not be the best thing to jump into before dental school. Like I said in my first post, maybe try something that's a little more basic dental science research.

 

[ScorpiORTHO]

can anyone give an example of what one would do as ortho research since it's mostly clinical? Measuring and comparing mostly?

 

[texas_dds]

can anyone give an example of what one would do as ortho research since it's mostly clinical? Measuring and comparing mostly?

I disagree, ortho research can be basic science too - there is a lot going on about alveolar bone biology, etc that requires all the lab work like PCR, gels, test tubes and all. Of course many investigators are into clinical research also. I hope our original poster does not get discouraged - I would suggest going to the ortho dept in the school you are going to in the fall and ask about research opportunities. 9 times out of 10 you will find them to be happy about your interest and more than willing to help you.

im also a bit tired of reading about people getting mad that predents want to go into ortho. Ive wanted to be an orthodontist since I was 15 and I truly believe that that having that dream on the backburner has kept me motivated along the way. true 90% of my class came into dschool wanting to do ortho - maybe a handful of those stuck with it - but please dont lump us all into the same category: moneyhungry and with with tunnel vision. I was very very careful to explore the rest of dentistry through school, but I kept coming back to ortho - thanks for reading!

 

[delicious]

I disagree, ortho research can be basic science too - there is a lot going on about alveolar bone biology, etc that requires all the lab work like PCR, gels, test tubes and all. Of course many investigators are into clinical research also. I hope our original poster does not get discouraged - I would suggest going to the ortho dept in the school you are going to in the fall and ask about research opportunities. 9 times out of 10 you will find them to be happy about your interest and more than willing to help you.

im also a bit tired of reading about people getting mad that predents want to go into ortho. Ive wanted to be an orthodontist since I was 15 and I truly believe that that having that dream on the backburner has kept me motivated along the way. true 90% of my class came into dschool wanting to do ortho - maybe a handful of those stuck with it - but please dont lump us all into the same category: moneyhungry and with with tunnel vision. I was very very careful to explore the rest of dentistry through school, but I kept coming back to ortho - thanks for reading!

I'm aware that there's a lot of basic science research done that is important to orthodontics. However, I don't think that most of it is done by people who hold certification in orthodontics. I felt that was more of a PhD thing.

 

[Fullosseousflap]

Check out the Papers by searching for Orthodontic papers at HubMed.

Find it here.

 

[asj]

hey anyone here who's actually doing an ortho program??