universidade de são paulo - Faculdade de Odontologia - Unesp

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(P>.05). Roughness maximum, median and minimum values are presented in
Table 2. There were no significant differences in the median roughness values
among all groups evaluated.
Discussion
Among the virulence attributes of Candida, the ability of adherence to
acrylic is a prerequisite for colonization and development of biofilms on denture
surfaces. Although this attribute has been extensively studied in C. albicans, few
studies evaluated C. glabrata adhesion, mainly to modified surfaces [4]. This is
particularly important because, in the last years, the prevalence of C. glabrata has
increased in human infections as a consequence of the emergence of the acquired
immunodeficiency syndrome and the wide use of immunosuppressive medications
[3]. Moreover, a high mortality rate has been observed when C. glabrata is
associated with systemic infections [3]. Therefore, in the present study we
evaluate the potential of two plasma treatments to modify a denture base acrylic
resin in order to reduce the C. glabrata adhesion. To the author’s knowledge, this
has yet not been investigated.
Various advantages have been attributed to plasma treatment. This
technique is dry, cold, fast and allows altering the surface properties of a wide
variety of materials [15]. Another positive aspect of this method is that the bulk
properties and function of the material are usually kept, as the depth of plasma
treatment is limited to a few nanometers of the surface [15,17,35]. In this study,
the plasma treatments intended to decrease the surface hydrophobicity to reduce