3D structuring of biocompatible and biodegradable polymers via stereolithography.

The production of user-defined 3D microstructures from biocompatible and biodegradable materials via free-form fabrication is an important step to create off-the-shelf technologies to be used as tissue engineering scaffolds. One method of achieving this is the microstereolithography of block copolymers, allowing high resolution microstructuring of materials with tuneable physical properties. A versatile protocol for the production and photofunctionalisation of pre-polymers for microstereolithography is presented along with a discussion of the possible microstereolithography set-ups and previous work in the field.