Edible, fluorescent silk tags can suss out fake medications

The explosion of online pharmacies and supply chain issues have made it easier for counterfeiters to profit from fake or adulterated medications. Researchers have created tags with fluorescent silk that could be placed in pills or liquid medicine. The source and quality of these pharmaceuticals can be verified with the help of the codes within the tags.

In the last few years, online pharmacies have taken off, delivering many types of medications directly to consumers. Some of these businesses are legitimate, but others operate illegally, supplying counterfeit drugs that are substandard, incorrectly labeled or laden with unwanted components. Global supply chain problems have made it easy for fake medications to enter the market. To instill trust in consumers, pharma companies label the outside packaging of their products with bar codes, QR codes, holograms and radio frequencies, allowing distributors and retailers to manage products throughout the supply chain. There are no equivalent codes for consumers to verify the source of individual pills or liquid doses inside a container. The substances are potentially unsafe to consume, but researchers have developed fluorescent synthetic materials as tracking codes. So, Seong-Wan Kim, Young Kim and colleagues wanted to see if silk, which is generally recognized as safe, could be placed directly onto medications and made to fluoresce, helping consumers make sure their purchases are what they claim to be.

The researchers genetically modified silkworms to produce silk fibroins that can be green or red. They dissolved the silk and created fluorescent solutions by applying them onto a thin, nine-mm-wide film of white silk. The blue violet, blue, and green light shone onto the grid, revealing the 3D cyan, green and red square patterns. The team designed an app that uses optical filters over the phone's camera and a deep learning algorithm to decode the fluorescent pattern and open up a website about the drug's source and authenticity. Because some liquid medications are alcohol-based, the researchers placed a silk film in a clear bottle of Scotch whisky and found that the fluorescent code was still readable with the app. The silk codes can be eaten, but they can also be eaten by the body, according to the researchers. The researchers say that putting the code on pills or in liquid doses could help patients and their care providers avoid the use of fake treatments.

More information: Edible Matrix Code with Photogenic Silk Proteins, ACS Central Science (2022). DOI: 10.1021/acscentsci.1c01233 Journal information: ACS Central Science Citation: Edible, fluorescent silk tags can suss out fake medications (2022, April 13) retrieved 13 April 2022 from https://phys.org/news/2022-04-edible-fluorescent-silk-tags-suss.html This document is subject to copyright. Apart from any fair dealing for the purpose of private study or research, no part may be reproduced without the written permission. The content is provided for information purposes only.