Abstract: The embodiments described herein include porous scaffolds formed from a stimuli-responsive polymer. The stimuli-responsive polymer of the scaffold creates a “smart” scaffold that changes properties in response to an effective stimulus applied to the stimuli-responsive polymer. In a preferred embodiment, an effective stimulus applied to the scaffold initiates a phase transition event in the stimuli-responsive polymer that results in a change in the volume of the pores of the scaffold. The scaffolds can be used to capture appropriately sized objects (e.g., cells) by using the volume-change properties of the pores. Relatedly, the scaffolds can be used as tissue-engineering scaffolds by capturing cells in the pores and introducing the cell-loaded scaffold into a cell-growth environment (e.g., in vivo).