Team:Cambridge/Project

Bactiridescence is a project based around the unique properties of reflectin, a squid protein with the highest refractive index of any known proteinaceous substance. In squid this protein forms complex platelets which act as [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Distributed_Bragg_reflector Bragg reflectors] to provide camouflage. We aim to express reflectin in E. coli and optimise the optical properties in order to build the groundwork for the manipulation of living structural colour. Read more about reflectin and structural colour here.

Project breakdown

We broke down our project into clear stages, with highly focussed objectives for each. Here, we outline how our plans were designed and modified in order to achieve each objective to as high a standard as possible. Our experiments are also put into context via links in this section.

• Preliminary Observations - confocal microscopy of native squid reflectin
• In Vivo - expression of recombinant reflectin in E. coli
• In Vitro - Purification of recombinant reflectin and production of thin films