High modulus (5.5 GPa) and strength (320 MPa) PLLA fibres with diameters down to 11 lm have been produced by a variation on melt-spinning using a compressed air-drag method to achieve spinning rates of up to 5000 m min1 [3]. In other work, as spun PLLA fibres with diameters 270 lm were further hot drawn to obtain fibres with 150 lm which had much improved properties; i.e. the strength and modulus increased from 95 MPa and 2.2 GPa up to 600 MPa and 5.4 GPa, respectively