Skewness and Kurtosis: Important Parameters in the Characterization of Dental Implant Surface Roughness—A Computer Simulation

The surface roughness affects the bone response to dental implants. A primary aim of the roughness is to increase the bone-implant interface shear strength. Surface roughness is generally characterized by means of surface roughness parameters. It was demonstrated that the normally used parameters cannot discriminate between surfaces expected to give a high interface shear strength from surfaces expected to give a low interface shear strength. It was further demonstrated that the skewness parameter can do this discrimination. A problem with this parameter is that it is sensitive to isolated peaks and valleys. Another roughness parameter which on theoretical grounds can be supposed to give valuable information on the quality of a rough surface is kurtosis. This parameter is also sensitive to isolated peaks and valleys. An implant surface was assumed to have a fairly well-defined and homogenous “semiperiodic” surface roughness upon which isolated peaks were superimposed. In a computerized simulation, it was demonstrated that by using small sampling lengths during measurement, it should be possible to get accurate values of the skewness and kurtosis parameters.