Clinical Study

A New Anatomically Based Nomenclature for the Roots and Root Canals—Part 1: Maxillary Molars

Table 1

Variations of roots and the canal anatomy of maxillary molars, as reported by various authors, with the numerous terms that have been used to name these aberrancies.

Root nomenclatureRoot canal nomenclatureReference

MB, DB, MP, DPMB, DB, MP, DPDi Fiore, 1999 [20]
MB, D, PMB1, MB2, P1, P2, DJohal, 2001 [16]
MB, DB, PMB1, MB2, DB, P1, P2, P3Maggiore et al., 2002 [17]
MB, DB, PMB1, MB2, MP, DB, PFavieri et al., 2006 [11]
MB, DB, PMB1, MB2, DB, P1, P2Aggarwal et al., 2009 [18]
MB, MP, P, DBMB, MP, M, P, DP, DBAdanir, 2007 [3]
MB, DB, PMB, MP, DB, 3PPasternak Júnior et al., 2007 [13]
MB, DB, 1st   P, 2nd P MB, DB, P1, P2Ulusoy and Görgül, 2007 [19]
MB, DB, PMB, DB, 2PPoorni et al., 2008 [15]
MB, DB, PMB1, MB2, MB3, DB, POzcan et al., 2009 [12]
MB, DB, P2MB, 2DB, 2Pde Almeida-Gomes et al., 2009 [14]
MB1, MB2, DB, MP, DPMB1, MB2, DB, MP, DPKottoor et al., 2010 [4]
MB, DB, PMB1, MB2, MB3, DB1, DB2, MP, DPKottoor et al., 2010 [7]
MB, DB, PMB1, MB2, DB1, DB2, MP, DPAlbuquerque et al., 2010 [21]
MB, DB, PMB, SMB, SDB, DBP, MBP, Karthikeyan and Mahalaxmi, 2010 [10]
DB, MP, DP

MB: mesiobuccal, DB: distobuccal, P: Palatal, MP: mesiopalatal, DP: distopalatal, M: mesial, D: distal, SMB: second mesiobuccal, MBP: mesiobuccopalatal, SDB: second distobuccal, DBP: distobuccopalatal.