Trivandrum Dental Journal

About the journal

The Trivandrum Dental Journal, the official publication of the Indian Dental Association, Trivandrum Branch, is intended to be a research periodical that aims to inform its readers of ideas, opinions, developments and key issues in dentistry- clinical, practical and scientific - stimulating interest, debate and discussion and an opportunity for life long learning, amongst dentists of all disciplines. All papers published in the TDJ are subject to rigorous peer review by our excellent review board. We have tried to design the journal in such a way that the readers can find the relevant information fast and easily.

The journal is intended for dentists, dental undergraduates, members of the dental team, hospital, community, academic and general practitioners.

To start with, we have

Review articles: scientific peer-reviewed papers with a focus on clinical research to enable researchers and scientists to communicate their findings to the rest of the community.

Case reports: articles, and papers on the latest developments and information relevant for those in dental practice. This section contains essentially case reports and general articles about clinical matters.

Practice section:. to include clinical guide, how-to-do-it papers, dental business articles, and the latest developments and information relevant for those in dental practice.

Abstracts: a selection of abstracts from dental journals.

We plan to include

Opinion section: intended to keep the readers aware of what people are thinking in dentistry today, and introduce differing views for debate by including letters and articles expressing the views and opinions of people that are open to debate and discussion.

Education section: any type of paper, article or report that is relevant to the vital subject of dental education, whether it is undergraduate, postgraduate, specialist or lifelong learning

Summaries: this section acts as a bridge between the practice and research sections, providing a summary of the research papers in this issue. Besides the abstract and ' in brief ’ box, in this page, we plan to include a comment on each paper by a specialist in the field, emphasizing the relevance of the paper, to ensure that the information from the research is easily available to both practitioners and researchers.

The cover page design

The shanku or the conch was considered as one of the common emblems of majority of Kerala feudal kingdoms of the past, including Travancore. The official Kerala state emblem also symbolises two elephants guarding the imperial conch and its imperial crest. The graphical representation of the conch (‘shanku’) is adapted to be the design on the cover page of the TRIVANDRUM DENTAL JOURNAL.

The The Cover Photograph : Cytokeratins, a group comprising at least 29 different proteins, are characteristic of epithelial and trichocytic cells. Monoclonal anti cytokeratins are specific markers of epithelial cell differentiation and have been widely used as tools in tumor identification and classification. Monoclonal Anti Pan Cytokeratin (mixture) is a broadly reactive reagent, which recognizes epitopes present in most human epithelial tissues. It facilitates typing of normal, metaplastic and neoplastic cells. Synergy between the various components results in staining amplification. This enables identification of cells, which would otherwise be stained only marginally. The mixture may aid in the discrimination of carcinomas and nonepithelial tumors such as sarcomas, lymphomas and neural tumors. It is also useful in detecting micrometastases in lymph nodes, bone marrow and other tissues and for determining the origin of poorly differentiated tumors. The cover photograph shows photomicrograph of central odontogenic fibroma, showing an island of odontogenic epithelium stained positively with Pan Cytokeratin.