Bacteriorhodopsin (b) thin films have been fabricated with varying amounts of the detergent Triton X-100 to measure the effect of this additive on the holographic performance of these thin films. Holographic spectroscopy is used to measure the effect of these detergents on the overall diffraction efficiency as well as on the phase and amplitude components of the overall signal. The diffracted rise and decay kinetics of these materials will also be presented as a function of varying detergent concentration. This research also studied the effect of this additive on the absorptive properties of bR-based thin films. Comparisons of the two complimentary sets of data are drawn.