Sensing Based on Collisional Quenching of Fluorescence

An important class of luminescence sensors are those based on the decrease of luminescence intensity and lifetime of the probes as function of analyte concentration. Assume that the probe intensity decays by a single exponential with an unquenched lifetime tq. If quenching occurs only by a dynamic (collisional) mechanism, then the ratio to/t is equal to Fq/F and is described by the classic Stern-Volmer equation 

The Dp and Dq are the diffusion coefficients of probe and quencher, respectively, N is the number molecules per millimole, andp is a factor that is related to the probability of each collision causing quenching and to the radius of interaction of probe and quencher. A more detailed treatment of fluorescence quenching including multiexponential intensity decays and static quenching is given elsewhere/635 There are many known collisional quenchers (analytes) which alter the fluorescence intensity and decay time. These include O2/19 2( 29 64 66) halides,(67 69) chlorinated hydrocarbons/705 iodide/715 bromate/725 xenon/735 acrylamide/745 succinimide/755 sulfur dioxide/765 and halothane/775 to name a few. 

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