The plasma copolymerisation of a functionalised monomer with a hydrocarbon diluent comonomer can be used to fabricate surfaces of controlled chemistry. By employing low plasma power, fragmentation can be kept to a minimum and the functional group preserved from the functionalised monomer to the plasma copolymer deposit. This has been demonstrated for carboxyls, carbonyls, alcohols and amines. Changing the ratio of functionalised monomer to hydrocarbon monomer allows films of varying functional group concentration (functional groups per 100 carbons) to be prepared. Substratum surface chemistry is known to play a critical role in the attachment, spreading and proliferation and differentiation of cells in tissue culture. The culturing of different cell types - keratinocytes (primary), endothelial cells (cell line) and osteoblasts (primary and cell line) - on plasma copolymer films containing carboxyl, carbonyl and alcohol functionalities has been investigated. Cell response has been explored with functional group concentration. Optimum attachment, spreading and proliferation were obtained on surfaces containing carboxyl groups - these surfaces contained 3-5 carboxyl groups per 100 carbons. Actin-staining by direct immunofluorescence was used to visualise changes in osteoblast cytoskeleton with substratum chemistry. It was observed that as the substratum carboxyl concentration increased cell spreading was notably enhanced. As few as 5 carboxyls per 100 carbons were sufficient to support good cell attachment and a well-defined polygonal cell morphology on an essentially hydrophobic surface.