Almost immediately after a person has heard the word "dentist" the first thought that comes to mind is the peculiar environment of the dentist office and the horrible sound of the dentist drill. Luckily for all of us things have changed for the better in the past 10 to 20 years, dentist offices have been built in order to provide a more inviting and comfortable atmosphere and the much feared dental drill is well on its way to be replaced by an instrument which seem at first sight might remind you of a scene from the movie Star Wars.

There is one well-known replacement to the dental drill, this replacement is the machine which uses air in order to penetrate the tooth during operations such as a root canal, this procedure is not referred to as drilling but as air abrasion.

The second option which is currently being developed is be referred to as a plasma needle. As the name implies this is a pen-like device that uses a mixture of helium, air, plasma and electrons in order to create a steady needle which works at a high enough temperature which allows it to penetrate the tooth and cauterize open blood vessels at the same time, the best part of this plasma needle is that it is virtually painless.

The physicist who invented the needle, Eva Stoffels-Adamowicz, suggests that this technology can be used not only in dentistry but during complex surgeries in order to remove cancerous tissue in a way that is virtually painless to the patient. Asian researchers who are interested in this technology have started to experiment with the idea and have also found a way to regulate the temperature and intensity of the needle by releasing a set amount of electrons into the plasma mixture.

Seen at first sight the plasma needle looks exactly like the lightsabers from the movie Star Wars, in a way we can say that reality is finally catching up the fiction by bringing to life the type of technology which will be useful not only the field of dentistry of medicine in general and will also gradually eliminate the fear of the dentist that keeps many people from getting the help they need.