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Biomedical Materials: Highlights A compilation of the best papers published within the last two years

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PLA-based biodegradable and tunable soft elastomers for biomedical applications. Amine Harrane, Adrien Leroy, Hélène Nouailhas, Xavier Garric, Jean Coudane and Benjamin Nottelet 2011 Biomed. Mater. 6 065006

Although desirable for biomedical applications, soft degradable elastomers having balanced amphiphilic behaviour are rarely described in the literature. Indeed, mainly highly hydrophobic elastomers or very hydrophilic elastomers with hydrogel behaviours are found. In this work, we developed thermoset degradable elastomers based on the photocross-linking of poly(lactide)-poly(ethylene glycol)-poly(lactide) (PLA-PEG-PLA) triblock
prepolymers. The originality of the proposed elastomers comes from the careful choice of the prepolymer amphiphilicity and from the possible modulation of their mechanical properties and degradation rates provided by cross-linkers of different nature. This is illustrated with the hydrophobic and rigid 2,4,6-triallyloxy-1,3,5-triazine compared to the hydrophilic and soft pentaerythritol triallyl ether. Thermal properties, mechanical properties, swelling behaviours, degradation rates and cytocompatibility have been evaluated. Results show that it is possible to generate a family of degradable elastomers covering a broad range of properties from a single biocompatible and biodegradable prepolymer.