Densen Cao, PhD, is founder and CEO of the CAO Group, Inc. in West Jordon/UT and engages in research, development, manufacturing, marketing and sales of products in Medical, Dental, Veterinary, Forensic, and LED lighting. Since year 2000, Dr. Cao has lead the company organically grown into a global company and has created many innovative technologies and products in engaged fields to serve its global customers.
Dr. Cao is the inventor of more than 160 issued and pending patents and published more than 20 technical papers.
Dr. Cao came to United States in 1986 from China to pursue PhD degree at University of Utah. Before founding the CAO Group, Inc. in year 2000, Dr. Cao worked as Coordinator of Materials Science at Clinical Research Associated (CRA, now as CR Foundation) and Staff Engineer at Fairchild Semiconductor.
Dr. Cao holds PhD and MS degrees in Materials Science and Engineering from University of Utah and MS and BS degrees in Electronic Engineering from Jilin University of China.
The notable technologies developed by Dr. Cao include LED dental curing lights, modern diode lasers, 360 degree beam LED lighting sources, LED forensic lights, and medicament delivery strips. Each of these technologies has made significant impact on the industry and is described below.
Dr. Cao invented LED dental curing light in year 2000 and introduced the first LED curing light to the market in 2001 with a distribution partner. The key patent is US patent 6,331,111 which teaches fundamental methods to build an LED curing light. There are more than 30 patents issued to Dr. Cao for LED curing light to cover all features of LED curing lights. LED curing light invented by Dr. Cao has been adopted by dentistry and become a standard tool in daily practice. As today, nearly all the LED curing light manufacturers licensed the technology from Dr. Cao. The technology is estimated to save more than $6K each year for each dentist in addition to providing better care for the patients.
Dr. Cao invented 360 degree beam LED light bulbs in 2002 and setup an instrumental structure to build an efficient, 360 degree beam LED bulb to replace traditional incandescent light bulb. Dr. Cao introduced the first 360 degree beam LED to the market in 2006. The key patents are 6,465,961; 6,634,770; and 6,746,885. The structure invented by Dr. Cao is essential to use LEDs to replace traditional incandescent and HID lamps. These teachings are adopted by LED lighting industry worldwide. As known, LED light bulbs will save up to 70% of energy comparing incandescent light source. LED light bulb is a $25 billion industry as today.
Dr. Cao invented modern diode laser systems in year 2003 with features of cartridge fiber management, disposable tips, touch screen control, wireless footswitch, battery operation, and etc. The first product was introduced to the dental market in 2003 with a distribution partner. The key patents are 7,485,116; 8,337,097; 8,834,457; 8,961,040; 8,967,883. These technologies enable the wide adoption of diode lasers in medical, dental, and veterinary fields to provide much desired patient/client care and become standards for modern diode laser products. The diode laser applications in dental, medical, and veterinary fields are more than $100 million industry as now and growing from year to year.
Dr. Cao invented the LED forensic lights in 2004. The key patents are 6,954,270; 7,252,678; and 7,267,457. The technology enables the investigators to collect evidence timely and efficiently. The products have been widely used in policy community and featured in CSI TV shows. The products have helped to solve many cases worldwide. Notable cases are Taiwan President shooting, JonBenet Ramsey, Lacy Peterson, Kobe Brian, O.J Simpson, and etc. The same principal has been used to oral cancer detection in the dentistry.
Dr. Cao and his colleagues invented advanced medicament delivery strip to deliver different medicaments to teeth surface in 2006. The technology features a flexible substrate and gelatin compound to enable patients to do the applications at anytime and anywhere. The technology was first applied to teeth whitening. The strip technology will be used for fluoride treatment, desensitizing, topical anesthetic, periodontal treatment, caries prevention, tooth remineralization, and any possible medicament delivery to oral environment.
Dr. Cao continues to work in solving critical issues in the dental and medical fields including methods to eliminate first and secondary caries, reversible cement for better bonding and de-bonding of prosthetics including orthodontic brackets, sterile endo process for 100% successful endo, better prosthetic materials for long term clinical success, advanced laser surgical procedures, laser cancer treatment, and etc. with a goal to make practitioners’ daily job Easier, Faster, and Better.