In the human body, cells experience a range of physicochemical properties. Recent research in stem cell differentiation has shed light on how they (and any cell for that matter) respond to their surrounding environment from chemistry and surface chemistry to surface topology and substrate stiffness/elasticity. Additionally, it is well known that cell behaviour is different in 2D compared to 3D. One way of understanding cell behaviour in 3D in vitro, is by providing a 3D construct or scaffold, generally a synthetic or biopolymer, in which cells can proliferate in.

Herein, polymer scaffolds were synthesized and characterized. Scaffolds were made by emulsion templating (water-in-oil emulsion) technique, known as high internal phase emulsions (HIPEs). The use of a monomer (styrene) in the oil phase allows for the polymerization in this phase and thus producing porous polymers (foams), which can be used as scaffolds for tissue and cell culture in 3D. Traditional low molecular weight surfactants (sorbitan monooleate) in the emulsion system have been replaced with block copolymer surfactants (polystyrene-b-poly(ethylene oxide), poly(1,4- butadiene)-b-poly(acrylic acid) and polystyrene-b-poly(acrylic acid)) with the aim of controlling the surface chemistry and topology. The scaffold morphologies were characterized by scanning electron microcopy (SEM), confocal laser scanning microscopy (CLSM) and micro x-ray computational tomography (micro-CT). To assess the scaffold surface chemistry, X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS) and contact angle measurements were carried out. The results obtained thus far suggest that block copolymers can used as effective surfactants in the emulsion process. While synthesis parameters need to be optimized and controlled, porous (but not always interconnecting) foams were produced. XPS and contact angle measurements revealed that the surface functionality provided by the block copolymers (poly(acrylic acid) moieties) are retained post synthesis and purification of the foams. This bodes very well to the engineering of ad hoc functionalized scaffold for stem cell engineering applications