The vast majority of biomedical polymers in use today are commonly used engineering plastics. Using these polymers for the manufacture of medical devices presents no unusual difficulties, except of exceptionally high standards of cleanliness and quality assurance. In contrast, the most exciting, future applications of polymers in medicine are based on polymers derived from living organisms (biopolymers) or polymers that were intentionally designed to be degradable in the human body. Biopolymers (such as collagen, alginate, or hyaluronic acid) are usually not melt processible and therefore require processing methods that are costly and rarely used in the plastics industry. Even more challenging is the use of biodegradable polymers. To create implants and medical devices from these thermoplastic but degradable polymers requires significant modifications of standard processing techniques used in industry. Using tyrosine-derived polymers as an example, the challenges in melt processing (high Tg, narrow window between Tg and Td, high melt viscosity, degradation during processing) and possible solutions will be discussed. In addition, the high cost of biomedical polymers makes it possible to develop sophisticated adaptations of existing processing methods, including air brushing, electrospinning, wet spinning, and 3D printing. Finally, the unique requirements of creating porous tissue scaffolds for tissue engineering and regenerative medicine have resulted in the development of foaming technologies that lead to the required open-pore structures. The need to adapt the pore structure of such tissue scaffolds to the biological needs or cells and tissues is a highly stimulating area of contemporary research
