Multi-color diffractive protein optics as a sensing platform

摘要

We report a new class of silk protein-based multi-color diffractive optical elements (DOEs) for sensing applications. The silk protein, known for its excellent biocompatibility, robust mechanical properties, high optical transmittance and controllable degradation, and ease of functionalization with biologically active components, providing a powerful pathway to integrate sensing and drug delivery into a single platform. The multi-color protein DOEs can generate a true color diffractive pattern when simultaneously illuminated by three laser pointers at proper wavelengths (650 nm, 532 nm, 405 nm). Compared with single-color DOEs, multi-color silk-DOEs carry out richer information and can be used in more complex situations, such as multi-level data concealment and drug release monitoring.