StretchBio_D4.3 – Report on living tissues issues affecting light propagation

This deliverable reports the experimental results of growing tissues and cells on top of nanopillar arrays and analysing whether this growth proceeds by penetrating between the nanopillars and whether this has an impact in the light transmission through the photonic system. The results show that even though the tissues and cells develop cilia that extend over several tens of micrometres across the nanopillar array surface, they only penetrate vertically around 100 nm. This result is almost general for all type of tissues, biopsies or cell types analysed. Little effects on light transmission have been observed, probably due to the fact that the light propagates through the central part of the upper section of the nanopillars and waveguides.