Patients expect beautiful, lifelike restorations, and dentists must provide them. However, clinical demands also require strength and durability. Fortunately, in just under a decade, monolithic zirconia has progressed from being a material known only for its posterior strength to a restorative option that can satisfy patients’ esthetic expectations in the smile zone.

BruxZir^® Esthetic Solid Zirconia represents a new category of dental zirconia made possible through years of research & development conducted at Glidewell Dental. Benefiting from an advanced colloidal manufacturing process, BruxZir Esthetic zirconia exhibits both high-performance strength and lifelike translucency. Proprietary coloration technology in the manufacturing process renders enhanced shade-matching and consistency for even more beautiful results. Identified as one of the “Top 100 Products in 2018” by Dentistry Today^®, BruxZir Esthetic zirconia is optimal for anterior cases and further solidifies BruxZir Solid Zirconia as the No. 1 prescribed brand of full-contour zirconia.

In 2009, the original BruxZir Solid Zirconia debuted as an unprecedented solution in restorative dentistry, offering tooth-colored esthetics with a strength akin to full-cast gold. The industry quickly embraced this all-ceramic material and its hammer-resistant fracture toughness. Within a year, doctors were prescribing more BruxZir restorations through Glidewell Laboratories than PFM restorations.

Today, BruxZir zirconia has been prescribed for more than 16 million restorations, and doctors’ confidence in the material is well-founded, as it has been validated by multiple clinical studies. Original BruxZir Solid Zirconia remains the only zirconia material backed by eight years of clinical validation conducted by independent researchers Drs. Rella and Gordon J. Christensen of the venerable Gordon J. Christensen Clinicians Report^® (CR Foundation^®; Provo, Utah).

In 2015, as doctors placed more and more BruxZir restorations in the esthetic zone, Glidewell Dental researchers began focusing on engineering a new anterior-grade formulation worthy of the BruxZir name. After three years of rigorous research & development, Glidewell Dental proudly debuted BruxZir Esthetic Solid Zirconia in May 2018, featuring an optimized combination of strength and translucency, purpose-driven vitality and beautiful shade matching.

Advanced colloidal processing sets BruxZir Esthetic apart from other zirconia restorative materials. While the vast majority of zirconia brands on the market use the press manufacturing process, which unceremoniously crushes zirconia powder under tons of pressure into the form of a laboratory milling blank, the BruxZir Esthetic colloidal process takes advantage of the natural forces of physics to organize and connect zirconia particles into an enhanced shape. This is achieved by taking the raw zirconia powder, mixing it into a slurry, and then, over a period of hours, slowly vacuuming out the liquid to only leave behind a hyper-organized powder.

This advanced colloidal process enables BruxZir Esthetic restorations to possess an optimal combination of durability and beauty. BruxZir Esthetic restorations exhibit an average flexural strength of 870 MPa — an increase of 74 percent over lithium disilicate. At the same time, the material maintains a translucent appearance that makes it ideal for cases throughout the anterior.

Early prescribers of the restorations have been amazed at its true-to-life appearance. President and CEO of Glidewell Dental, Jim Glidewell, has gone as far as to say, “BruxZir Esthetic zirconia is simply the most beautiful material we’ve ever produced.”

Along with the use of advanced colloidal processing, BruxZir Esthetic also benefits from the most advanced shading technology ever developed by Glidewell Dental. In order to create a comprehensive range of shades, the BruxZir Esthetic formulation was individually engineered 18 times to create options that precisely match the 16 VITA^® classical shades (VITA Zahnfabrik H. Rauter GmbH & Co. KG; Bad Säckingen, Germany), along with white and bleached. For the clinician, this means that the unmodified zirconia milling blank exhibits its prescribed shade prior to fabrication of the restoration. Experienced dental technicians can then further characterize the shade to match the precise esthetic demands of each case.

This transformative, new material is indicated for single-unit crowns anywhere in the mouth and bridges of up to 4 units in the anterior. Additionally, BruxZir Esthetic restorations require minimal preparation, with only 0.7 mm of reduction necessary. With prices starting at only $109 per unit, BruxZir Esthetic offers an unprecedented combination of strength and beauty, providing clinicians with a dynamic solution for their patients’ needs.