Abstract: This review describes conventional and modern techniques of porous organic polymer synthesis. A huge variety of polymer architectures and functions can be gained by foaming, phase separation, imprinting or templating ap-proaches. Several applications of porous polymers are discussed, focusing on biotechnological and biomedical applications, such as chromatography, protein synthesis, drug carrier systems, tissue engineering and others. (c) 2002 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved