Tunable light-focusing behavior of engineered bacterial microlenses with controllable shapes

Recently, engineered bacterial cells have been shown to behave as optically-active photonic devices comparable to industrially fabricated microlenses¹. Bacterial cells can be encapsulated within a layer of polysilicate through surface display of the sea sponge enzyme silicatein, which mineralizes a polysilicate coating. The addition of this polysilicate layer significantly enhances the ability of these cells to guide, scatter, and focus light¹. However, this previous technique was limited to creating rod-shaped microlenses, which are not ideal for all applications. Here we expand upon this technology by engineering the shapes of silicatein-displaying bacterial cells. Through the overexpression of the genes <i>bolA</i> ^2-5 and <i>sulA</i> ^6,7 or through the use of the drug A22^8,9, we are able to alter <i>Escherichia coli</i> cells from their characteristic rod-like shape to either spherical or filamentous forms. Round cells encapsulated in polysilicate were shown to scatter light more intensely and symmetrically than rod-shaped cells, while encapsulated filamentous cells were shown to guide light similarly to an optical fiber. This control over the size and shape of optically-active cells is a major advancement towards developing bio-engineered photonic devices such as nanophotonic waveguides, spherical microlens arrays, and advanced biosensors.