MODEL DEVICES BASED ON BACTERIORHODOPSIN - PROTOTYPES OF POSITION-SENSITIVE PHOTODETECTORS

Based on dry highly ordered multylayer films of bacteriorhodopsin (BR) -containing purple membranes (PM) from Halobacterium salinarium (forme rly H. halobium) as a new nontraditional long-term functioning (at lea st a few years) photosensitive (approx. tens of mJ/cm2) material, a bi otechnical system has been developed which can be considered to be a m odel of spectrally selective (in the visible range) position sensitive fast (up to several ps) reversible (not less than 10(5) photocycles) light-electricity detector. The active element (uniformally oriented P Ms) has been constructed by the method of electrophoretic sedimentatio n on optically transparent current-conducting support (indium-tin-oxid e covered glass). Construction details and characteristics of the alre ady created device are presented. Some perspectives and agvantages of BR, both in native and chemically modified forms, for use in molecular electronic applications are discussed.