A computational quantum model for periodontal low-level laser therapy: Analytical prediction of coherence and excitation

From a father’s questions to a quantum model in periodontology

This research did not begin in a laboratory or a seminar room; it began in a father’s attempt to stay close to his son. Circumstances beyond my control led to an unexpected separation from my 13‑year‑old son, Saakshar. To remain present in his life, I started teaching him physics and chemistry online during his 8th grade, and continue now as he enters 9th grade. Those sessions became much more than tuition—they reopened doors in my own mind that I thought had long been closed.

As I explained basic atomic models to him, my childhood questions resurfaced with surprising intensity. Why do we so casually accept the atom as spherical? Why not some other geometry? Why should I simply accept subatomic particles “as they are described” in textbooks, without questioning the pictures I had memorized as a student? These simple, almost childlike questions pushed me to look again, but this time with the eyes of both a father and a researcher.

Rediscovering quantum mechanics through a child’s curiosity

To answer these questions honestly—for him and for myself—I went back to the history of atomic theory after Bohr’s model. I walked again through the developments that followed: the birth of quantum mechanics, the shift from orbits to orbitals, and the radical idea that particles could be described by wavefunctions and probabilities rather than fixed paths.

In this journey, I immersed myself in the works of Max Planck, Erwin Schrödinger, and many others whose ideas had once seemed abstract when I first encountered them as a student. Now, however, their work felt deeply personal. I explored quantum lectures, including those from MIT and other open resources, not as exam preparation but as a way of rebuilding my own conceptual foundations. My solitude became a space of focused study and reflection.

One question particularly captivated me: how does nature achieve such astonishing efficiency in processes like photosynthesis? Quantum biology suggests that coherence and quantum effects may play a role in the remarkably efficient transfer of energy in photosynthetic complexes. This idea—that biological systems might harness quantum principles—stayed with me.

Connecting quantum ideas to periodontal low-level laser therapy

As a periodontist and researcher, my clinical world revolves around inflamed tissues, healing responses, and treatment modalities such as low-level laser therapy (LLLT). I began to ask: if quantum coherence and excitation transport help explain the efficiency of photosynthesis, could analogous quantum principles help us understand what happens during LLLT at the cellular and subcellular level in periodontal therapy?

This thought was the turning point. What started as an effort to make atomic theory understandable to my son gradually evolved into a deeper conceptual bridge: from quantum mechanics to quantum biology, and finally to a computational quantum model for periodontal LLLT. The question shifted from “How do I teach this chapter?” to “Can I mathematically capture coherence and excitation behavior during laser–tissue interaction in periodontology?”

The result is the work now published as “A computational quantum model for periodontal low-level laser therapy: Analytical prediction of coherence and excitation.” It represents an attempt to analytically describe how coherence and excitation might emerge in this therapeutic context, using a quantum-mechanical framework grounded in what is known from physics and biological energy transfer.

A research paper as a record of a relationship

Scientifically, this study aims to contribute to the theoretical understanding of LLLT in periodontology by bringing a computational quantum perspective to a clinically familiar therapy. Personally, it is much more than that. For me, this paper is a quiet record of hundreds of hours of online calls, shared digital whiteboards, and explanations—all born from a father’s yearning to stay connected to his child.

The acknowledgment section of the article briefly notes this dimension, but it can never fully convey the emotional landscape behind the equations. Every integral and differential equation in this work is, in a way, intertwined with conversations with my son: his “why” and “how,” his doubts, and his curiosity that mirrored my own from decades earlier.

If there is one message I hope readers take from this story, it is that research is rarely a purely intellectual exercise. Behind models, graphs, and formulas, there are often deeply human stories—of separation, resilience, love, and the search for meaning. This work is my testimony as a father and a researcher: that even in solitude and distance, it is possible to transform pain into inquiry, and inquiry into something that may, in time, help patients and advance our understanding of biology and therapy.

For anyone reading this—whether as a clinician, physicist, student, or fellow parent—I hope you can sense the undercurrent of emotion beneath the technical language, and see this research not only as a quantum model, but as the trace of a relationship between a father and his son.