Polymer microarrays can be characterised and screened using a range of techniques to assess both their physico-chemical properties and their biological responses. The techniques are applied to the microarray format in which the polymers are synthesised, and therefore provide extremely rapid data on their suitability for the application, but with no compromise of the integrity and relevance of the results.
The main advantage of such a high-throughput platform is that all arrayed materials are subjected to the same conditions and can be screened in a single experiment. This allows the rapid acquisition of large data sets that can then be computed to further our understanding of the factors directing specific materials properties.