Tiny edible tag could help fight counterfeit drugs

Created by researchers at Purdue University, the tag uses a technique called ‘physical unclonable functions,’ or PUF, that was originally developed for authentication in information and hardware security. The tag acts as a digital fingerprint, generating a different response each time it is scanned under a compatible LED light. According to the Purdue team, this makes them extremely difficult to duplicate, even for the original manufacturer. The work appears in Nature Communications.  

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"Every single tag is unique, offering a much higher level of security," said Young Kim, an associate professor in Purdue's Weldon School of Biomedical Engineering.

While PUFs have been around for some time, the researchers claim this is the first time an edible version has been made. It’s constructed of a thin, transparent film made from silk proteins and fluorescent proteins genetically fused together. Shining various LED light sources on the tag excites the fluorescent silk microparticles, causing them to generate a different random pattern each time.