Micro-imaging system with photochromic biofilm -- bacteriorhodopsin as recording medium

The photochromic retinal protein bacteriorhodopsin (BR) modified by genetic method is considered as a promising material for optical and holographic recording because of its effective photochemistry, high stability and unique reversibility. The parallel image recording can largely increase the speed of data writing and reading in comparison with the bit-type recording. Here, we established a micro-imaging system with BR-D96N biofilm as recording medium. The optical image loaded on a LCSLM was illuminated by an argon laser (514 nm) and was micro-imaged on the BR film with a high resolution lens. The BR film was mounted in a two dimensional micropositioning system for accurately addressing. The recorded images were readout by a CCD camera under weak illumination of 514 nm laser. In this system, we can record 1000 frames of microimages on the BR film with each frame having an area of 460μm × 350μm. This system can be developed into a two dimensional parallel digital optical data storage setup.