Molecular chemistry fluorescence detection

Abstract Fluorescent molecules have been widely used as biomolecular labels, enzyme substrates, environmental indicators, and cellular stains and thus constitute indispensable tools in chemistry, physics, biology, and medicinal sciences. The large variation in the photophysics of the available fluorophores connected with chemical alterations give fluorescent probe techniques an almost unlimited scope for the detection of specific molecules and the investigation of intermolecular interactions on a molecular scale. 

It is now possible to design the experiments using molecular beams and laser techniques such that the initial vibrational, rotational, translational or electronic states of the reagent are selected or final states of products are specified. In contrast to the measurement of overall rate constants in a bulk kinetics experiment, state-to-state differential and integral cross sections can be measured for different initial states of reactants and final states of products in these sophisticated experiments. Molecular beam studies have become more common, lasers have been used to excite the reagent molecules and it has become possible to detect the product molecules by laser-induced fluorescence . These experimental studies have put forward a dramatic change in experimental study of chemical reactions at the molecular level and has culminated in what is now called state-to-state chemistry. 

The design of fluorescent sensors is of major importance because of the high demand in analytical chemistry, clinical biochemistry, medicine, the environment, etc. Numerous chemical and biochemical analytes can be detected by fluorescence methods cations (H+, Li+, Na+, K+, Ca2+, Mg2+, Zn2+, Pb2+, Al3+, Cd2+, etc.), anions (halide ions, citrates, carboxylates, phosphates, ATP, etc.), neutral molecules (sugars, e.g. glucose, etc.) and gases (O2, CO2, NO, etc.). There is already a wide choice of fluorescent molecular sensors for particular applications and many of them are commercially available. However, there is still a need for sensors with improved selectivity and minimum perturbation of the microenvironment to be probed. Moreover, there is the potential for progress in the development of fluorescent sensors for biochemical analytes (amino acids, coenzymes, carbohydrates, nucleosides, nucleotides, etc.). 

Laser-induced fluorescence (LIF) depends on the absorption of a photon to a real molecular state, and is therefore a much more sensitive technique, capable of detection of sub-part-per-billion concentrations. Thus, this is the most suitable for measurement of those minor species which are the transient intermediates in the reaction network. Here a tunable laser is required, as well as an electronic absorption system falling in an appropriate wavelength region serendipitously, many of the important transient species have band systems which are suitably located for application of LIF probing. The ability to sensitively detect transitions originating from electronically as well as vibrationally excited levels of a number of molecules offers the possibility of inquiring into the participation of non-equilibrium chemistry in combustion processes. 

There are various potential applications of photophysical phenomena in analytical chemistry. The relatively short lifetimes of most excited states, however, is a serious drawback to the construction of practical devices but studies which focus on finding ways to extend triplet lifetimes have now been described by Harriman et al. Kneas et al. have examined new types of luminescent sensor on polymer supports, and both Neurauter et al. and Marazuela et al. have designed sensors based on the ruthenium(II) polypyridine complex for the detection of carbon dioxide. A system, based on the formation of twisted intramolecular charge transfer states, has been devised for measuring the molecular weight of polymeric matrices (Al-Hassan et a/.), and the chemical reactivity at the interface of self-assembled monolayers has been assessed using fluorescence spectroscopy (Fox et al). 

Recent advances in ultrasensitive instrumentation have allowed the detection of individual atoms and molecules in solids [174, 175], on surfaces [176, 177], and in the condensed phase [178, 179] using laser-induced fluorescence. In particular, single molecule detection in the condensed phase enables scientists to explore new frontiers in many scientific disciplines, such as chemistry, molecular biology, molecular medicine and nanostructure materials. There are several optical methods to study single molecules, the principles and application of which have been reviewed by Nie and Zare [180]. These methods are listed in Tab. 6.12. 

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