Multidimensional Vascularized Polymers using Degradable Sacrificial Templates

© 2014 WILEY-VCH Verlag GmbH & Co. KGaA, Weinheim 1 wileyonlinelibrary.com and autonomous materials. [ 22–24 ] Porous materials not only mediate transport of fl uids in fi ltration, [ 25 ] but also regulate ion exchange in battery electrodes [ 26 ] and separator fi lms, [ 27 ] facilitate new tissue growth in bioscaffolds, [ 28–31 ] and increase strength-to-weight ratio in structural solids. [ 32 ] No fabrication technique has emerged with the fl exibility to control size and dimensionality across all of these applications. Esser-Kahn et al. [ 23 ] recently introduced the vaporization of sacrifi cial components (VaSC) technique. In their work, 1D poly(lactic acid) (PLA) fi bers are treated with tin(II) oxalate (SnOx) catalyst to undergo thermal depolymerization and vaporization at ≈200 °C. After embedding “sacrifi cial” PLA in a thermoset composite and subsequent thermal treatment, the fi bers vaporized, forming vasculature that is their inverse replica. By introducing various functional fl uids into the microvasculature, desirable properties were imparted on the composite, such as thermal regulation, magnetic or electrical modulation, and in situ reaction of chemical species. [ 23 ] In this work, we extend the application of VaSC by introducing sacrifi cial templates across all levels of spatial dimensionality and spanning several orders of magnitude in size, enabling a wide range of vascular and porous architectures. Multidimensional Vascularized Polymers using Degradable Sacrifi cial Templates