Fluorophore properties coupling

Gerber, S., Reil, F., Hohenester, U., Schlagenhaufen, T., Krenn, J. R., and Lcitner, A. (2007). Tailoring light emission properties of fluorophores by coupling to resonance-tuned metallic nanostructures. Physical Review B 75 073404-073404. 

The following sections describe two methods of coupling fluorescent labels to functionalized DNA probes. Other fluorophores or quenching molecules may be attached using similar procedures with careful reference to the properties and reactivities of such labels as discussed in Chapter 9. 

It is to be hoped that this chapter will have given readers a better understanding of the basic principles of ion recognition detected by changes in photophysical properties of a fluorophore coupled to an ionophore. Examples have been chosen to illustrate the immense variety of structures that have been already designed and the inexhaustible possibilities of creating new systems. 

D Souza DM, Kiel A, Herten DP, Muller TJJ (2008) Synthesis, structure and emission properties of spirocyclic benzofuranones and dihydroindolones - a domino insertion-coupling-isomerization-Diels-Alder approach to rigid fluorophores. Chem Eur J 14 529-547... 

Mass spectrometry is a fairly universal technique it is a label-free detection technique and can be applied to any molecule as long as it can be ionized (i.e. that it presents a protonation site for instance). Optical techniques (e.g. UV absorbance and fluorescence-based techniques) require that the analytes present given properties to be detected. They must absorb or emit in the UV or in the fluorescence range. If they do not, they must be coupled to an external moiety (aromatic group, fluorophore) that presents such absorption/emission properties, and this imposes an additional derivatization of the analytes before their detection, but after their separation for instance... 

The manner in which protons diffuse is a reflection of the physical properties of the environment, the geometry of the diffusion space, and the chemical composition of the surface that defines the reaction space. The biomembrane, with heterogeneous surface composition and dielectric discontinuity normal to the surface, markedly alters the dynamics of proton transfer reactions that proceed close to its surface. Time-resolved measurements of fast, diffusion-controlled reactions of protons with chromophores and fluorophores allow us to gauge the physical, chemical, and geometric characteristics of thin water layers enclosed between phospholipid membranes. Combination of the experimental methodology and the mathematical formalism for analysis renders this procedure an accurate tool for evaluating the properties of the special environment of the water-membrane interface, where the proton-coupled energy transformation takes place. 

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