Silk proteins toward optical and electrical devices

Silk fibroin, the protein the protagonist of this book, has a unique combination of properties generated by the repetitive sequence of its amino acids and the precise self-assembly process that animals in nature developed to spin it. These peculiar properties, together with its good biocompatibility, stimulated the interest in developing silk fibroin into a biomaterial for a wide range of biomedical applications, from tissue engineering to drug delivery, to material support for in vitro study, to clinical applications. All these aspects are well covered in the other chapters of the present book. More recently, silk fibroin has been proposed for more technological applications like optics and electronics, opening a new field of research at the intersection between biomaterials and technology. In this chapter, we will discuss these new applications of silk, the primary material science that enabled them, and the interface between technological devices and the biological environment.