When teeth are extracted, the bone undergoes a dramatic change or remodeling. In time, the maxilla resorbs to a knife-edge ridge in a bucco-palatal direction, obliquely orientated from the horizontal plane, and the ridge resorbs to as thin as a few sheets of paper, but camouflaged by as much as 14 or 15 mm of fibromucosal tissue bucco-lingually and as much as 7 to 10 mm covering the residual bony crest. In the mandible, resorption often results in remodeling the mandible in a downward and flat direction leaving only the knife-like mylohoid ridge which has often been mistaken for the alveolar crest when covered by the mucoperiosteum. However, the mandibular periosteum is very thin, perhaps 1 to 2 mm.

From much experience I had come to realize that a new implant had to be designed that could readily be placed into these knife-edge ridges, shallow and oblique flaring ridges. An implant had to be de-signed that did not have to depend on its depth, diameter or degree of divergence to acquire retention. Instead, the implant had to be designed so that its mesio-distal diameter would give it its retention. An implant had to be designed where there were openings large enough to allow bone rather than merely fibrous tissue to grow through. An implant had to be so uniquely designed so that it could immediately withstand lateral as well as occlusal forces without requiring immediate stabilization. An implant had to be designed to be easily fitted into these knife-edge and shallow ridges and have a neck that could be bent to parallel the posts to one another. An implant had to be created that could easily be inserted by many dentists with the same degree of success. An implant also had to be designed to enable the researchers throughout the world to achieve the same histological results on animals as well as humans and on animal studies be able to keep them alive after re-moving their bone specimens. Thus was the creation of the Linkow wedge-shaped Endosteal Blade-Vents. I often parallel the designing of these various shaped blades with that of designing the nose cone of our space ships. Until the proper pitch and shape was created through much trial and error, the nose cone could never re-enter the earth's atmosphere without burning up. Similarly, until the new dimensional type blades were formed, too often the previous designed types of implants could never be inserted into the shallow, knife-edge ridges that exist in the atrophying maxillae and mandibles.

It was the very same teeth created by God that had been lost due to various aging and periodontal pathology because they could not tolerate the lateral forces brought to bear upon them. Therefore, after they were extracted and after remolding of the bone there remains even less bone than before, so why should implants be designed to recreate

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