Polymers as Materials for Tissue Engineering Scaffolds

A material with a given overall chemical composition may be, furthermore, in very different physical states: it may be a random or a block copolymer, it may be an interpenetrated network, it may be semicrystalline or amorphous, vitreous or rubbery under physiological conditions. These possibilities are afforded by polymerization chemistry and/or subsequent processing or treatment, and make polymers such unique materials for tissue engineering applications. This chapter discusses a structure, composition and function of the polymers. It presents some of the properties of polymer structures important for their use as scaffolds, such as their apparent density, mechanical stiffness, and degradability. The chapter reviews them and other, and introduces the quantities and measurements that are useful for their characterization. The different scaffold structures discussed in the chapter may be combined into compound constructs to meet specific objectives. Some examples include scaffold‐cum‐gel constructs, and other multicomponent scaffold constructs.