Measurements of acoustic properties of teeth by impulsive-wave acoustic microscope system

A spectral analysis method was introduced into an impulsive-wave SAM system to measure the spatial variation of acoustic properties in hard dental tissues. Longitudinal velocity was determined from the frequency intervals of maxima (or minima) in the total power spectrum of two separated short pulses reflected from the surface and the bottom of a sliced specimen. The attenuation coefficient was further determined by the difference of the power spectra of the above two pulses. It has been found that the velocity and the attenuation coefficient vary considerably with depth of the tooth in the enamel and dentine.