Types of bite

Bite or 'occlusion' is the contact and position of the teeth when the jaws are clenched. The dimensions of the lower dental arch are smaller than the dimensions of the upper arch. The upper arch has an elliptical shape, while the lower arch has a parabolic shape.

Antagonists are the teeth with which an individual tooth comes into contact during a bite. The incisors upper jaws are wider than the incisors lower jaws. Therefore, the teeth of the upper jaw are displaced distally against the teeth of the lower jaw and therefore each tooth (except lower I1 and upper M3) is in contact with two teeth of the opposite row (it has two antagonists). The ``primary antagonist is the eponymous tooth of the second jaw, while the ``minor antagonist is the adjacent articulating tooth of the second jaw.

The plane of occlusion is the plane formed by the biting surface of all teeth. The contact line where the teeth of the upper and lower jaw meet is called Spee's contact (occlusal) curve. It is convex to the lower jaw and its stretching leads to the mandibular articulation.

We distinguish individual types of bite: "psalidodontia", "labidodontia", "opistodontia", "prognathodontia", "stegodontia" and "hiatodontia".