title: Synthetic Engineering of Spider Silk Fiber as Implantable Optical Waveguides for Low-Loss Light Guiding.
abstract: A variety of devices used for biomedical engineering have been fabricated using protein polymer because of their excellent properties, such as strength, toughness, biocompatibility, and biodegradability. In this study, we fabricated an optical waveguide using genetically engineered spider silk protein. This method has two significant advantages: (1) recombinant spider silk optical waveguide exhibits excellent optical and biological properties and (2) biosynthesis of spider silk protein can overcome the limitation to the research on spider silk optical waveguide due to the low yield of natural spider silk. In detail, two kinds of protein-based optical waveguides made from recombinant spider silk protein and regenerative silkworm silk protein were successfully prepared. Results suggested that the recombinant spider silk optical waveguide showed a smoother surface and a higher refractive index when compared with regenerative silkworm silk protein. The optical loss of recombinant spider silk optical waveguide was 0.8 ± 0.1 dB/cm in air and 1.9 ± 0.3 dB/cm in mouse muscles, which were significantly lower than those of regenerative silkworm silk optical waveguide. Moreover, recombinant spider silk optical waveguide can meet the demand to guide and efficiently deliver light through biological tissue. In addition, recombinant spider silk optical waveguide showed low toxicity to cells in vitro and low-level inflammatory reaction with surrounding tissue in vivo. Therefore, recombinant spider silk optical waveguide is a promising implantable device to guide and deliver light with low loss.
authors.affiliation: Department of Advanced Interdisciplinary Studies, Institute of Basic Medical Sciences and Tissue Engineering Research Center, Academy of Military Medical Sciences , 27 TaipingRoad, Beijing 100850, People's Republic of China.
authors.forename: Xin
authors.initials: X
authors.lastname: Qiao
authors.affiliation: State Key Laboratory of Microbial Metabolism, Joint International Research Laboratory of Metabolic & Developmental Sciences, and School of Life Sciences and Biotechnology, Shanghai Jiao Tong University , 800 Dongchuan Road, Shanghai 200240, People's Republic of China.
authors.forename: Zhigang
authors.initials: Z
authors.lastname: Qian
authors.affiliation: Department of Advanced Interdisciplinary Studies, Institute of Basic Medical Sciences and Tissue Engineering Research Center, Academy of Military Medical Sciences , 27 TaipingRoad, Beijing 100850, People's Republic of China.
authors.forename: Junjie
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Li
authors.affiliation: Department of Advanced Interdisciplinary Studies, Institute of Basic Medical Sciences and Tissue Engineering Research Center, Academy of Military Medical Sciences , 27 TaipingRoad, Beijing 100850, People's Republic of China.
authors.forename: Hongji
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Sun
authors.affiliation: Department of Advanced Interdisciplinary Studies, Institute of Basic Medical Sciences and Tissue Engineering Research Center, Academy of Military Medical Sciences , 27 TaipingRoad, Beijing 100850, People's Republic of China.
authors.forename: Yao
authors.initials: Y
authors.lastname: Han
authors.affiliation: State Key Laboratory of Microbial Metabolism, Joint International Research Laboratory of Metabolic & Developmental Sciences, and School of Life Sciences and Biotechnology, Shanghai Jiao Tong University , 800 Dongchuan Road, Shanghai 200240, People's Republic of China.
authors.forename: Xiaoxia
authors.identifier: http://orcid.org/0000-0001-8375-1616
authors.initials: X
authors.lastname: Xia
authors.affiliation: Department of Advanced Interdisciplinary Studies, Institute of Basic Medical Sciences and Tissue Engineering Research Center, Academy of Military Medical Sciences , 27 TaipingRoad, Beijing 100850, People's Republic of China.
authors.forename: Jin
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Zhou
authors.affiliation: Department of Advanced Interdisciplinary Studies, Institute of Basic Medical Sciences and Tissue Engineering Research Center, Academy of Military Medical Sciences , 27 TaipingRoad, Beijing 100850, People's Republic of China.
authors.forename: Chunlan
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Wang
authors.affiliation: Department of Advanced Interdisciplinary Studies, Institute of Basic Medical Sciences and Tissue Engineering Research Center, Academy of Military Medical Sciences , 27 TaipingRoad, Beijing 100850, People's Republic of China.
authors.forename: Yan
authors.initials: Y
authors.lastname: Wang
authors.affiliation: Department of Advanced Interdisciplinary Studies, Institute of Basic Medical Sciences and Tissue Engineering Research Center, Academy of Military Medical Sciences , 27 TaipingRoad, Beijing 100850, People's Republic of China.
authors.forename: Changyong
authors.identifier: http://orcid.org/0000-0003-1526-3308
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Wang
mesh_terms: D000818:Animals; D012831:Bombyx; D051379:Mice; D019736:Prostheses and Implants; D011994:Recombinant Proteins; D047011:Silk; D013112:Spiders
chemical_list: D011994:Recombinant Proteins; D047011:Silk
keywords: biodegradation; genetic engineering; implantation; optical waveguides; spider silk protein