Advanced polymer-based composites and structures for biomedical applications

A fast increasing demand of medical products based on biomaterials and tissue engineering has led to an extensive growth in biomedical research in the past two decades. A highly interesting class of biomaterials are polymer-based composites, which nowadays are widely used in biomedical applications due to their outstanding physical and mechanical properties. In this paper, we aim to summarize the advancement in polymer-based composites with regard to their properties, structure and fabrication using different techniques. Bioactive polymer-based composites, such as bone-forming, electrically conductive, magnetic, bactericidal and oxygen-releasing materials, as well as non-bioactive polymer-based composites containing reinforcing fillers and porogens are discussed. Amongst others, scaffold structures fabricated by particle leaching, electrospinning and additive manufacturing are described. In each section, significant and recent advances of polymer-based composites in biomedical applications are addressed.