Biodegradable Stent Polymer Degradation

Bioresorbable coronary stents are built from PLLA/PLGA copolymer struts designed to hold an artery open for months, then hydrolyze away. This simulator renders the diamond-cell strut lattice of such a scaffold and drives it with the real chain-scission kinetics behind bulk polymer erosion: an autocatalytic Pitt–Schindler model tracks molecular weight loss, a threshold model derived from the critical entanglement weight tracks the resulting collapse in radial strength, and a diffusion-lag model tracks scaffold mass loss — reproducing the well-known clinical pattern where a bioresorbable scaffold loses most of its mechanical support long before it visibly disappears. Scrub the timeline or press play to watch 36 months of degradation, and tune the glycolide content and autocatalysis strength to see how copolymer chemistry changes the degradation profile.