Newsweek

Female Scientist Who Changed Dental Care Honored

Sumita Mitra made a product dentists and their patients love, which almost never happens.
On Australia's National Smile Day, clown doctor, Dr. B. Looney, uses a giant toothbrush to clean the teeth on the face at the entrance to Luna Park in Sydney in 2010.
GettyImages-98206683

She wasn’t aiming to make  history. But in the late 1990s,  when Sumita Mitra, a chemist at 3M, began to use nanotechnology to improve dental fillings, that’s exactly what happened. Now found in dental offices—and virtually every mouth—her fillings are one of those life-changing innovations we take for granted. 

spoke with

You’re reading a preview, subscribe to read more.

More from Newsweek

Newsweek16 min readWorld
‘We Are Facing The Most Complex Security Environment Since World War Ii’
SHORTLY AFTER RETURNING FROM HIS FIRST LEAD-ers-level visit to Washington, D.C., Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida sat down with Newsweek for an exclusive interview in his Tokyo office to discuss the main takeaways from his trip, as well as the h
Newsweek13 min readWorld
Red Cows, Gaza And The End Of The World
IT IS SAID THAT THIS IS WHERE THE WORLD began—and perhaps where it will end. The true epicenter of the war in the Holy Land is not the devastated Gaza Strip, under Israeli assault since Hamas’ bloody raid last October sparked the region’s deadliest c
Newsweek1 min read
Living On The Edge
An 18th-century cottage clings to the precipice following a dramatic cliff fall in the coastal village of Trimingham on April 8. The homeowner, who bought the property in 2019 for around $165,000, will now see the structure demolished as the saturate

Related Books & Audiobooks