Patent ID: 8557163

Claim:
A method of fabricating a three dimensional scaffold suitable for tissue-engineering having a controlled microporous structure and a controlled macroporous structure using cryogenic prototyping comprising: a) dispensing a first polymer solution in one direction into a reaction chamber to form a first lane; wherein said first polymer solution comprises a first polymer and a first solvent; wherein said reaction chamber has a first temperature which is at or below the freezing point of said first solvent; b) dispensing a second polymer solution into said reaction chamber to form a second lane; wherein said second polymer solution comprises a second polymer and a second solvent; wherein said second polymer solution is dispensed such that said second lane is arranged next to said first lane in the same orientation as said first lane and being in contact with said first lane on one side; wherein said reaction chamber has a second temperature, wherein said second temperature is the same or different from said first temperature as long as it is at or below the freezing point of said second solvent; and c) dispensing further polymer solutions into said reaction chamber by repeating steps a) and b) to form further lanes in a first plane; d) repeating steps a) to c) to form further lanes in a next plane, wherein at least some of the lanes in said next plane are in contact with said lanes of said first plane; e) repeating step d) to form a three-dimensional scaffold comprising different planes of lanes formed by said polymer solutions; wherein in any of steps c) to d) said polymer solutions are dispensed such that macropores of said controlled macroporous structure are created; f) removing said solvents from said three-dimensional scaffold so obtained, wherein said method further comprises using different time intervals between dispensing of said different planes into said reaction chamber, and further comprises dispensing lanes, threads or drops forming a subsequent plane into said reaction chamber only after the lanes, threads or drops forming the previous plane are frozen.