Abstract
The technology and applications of fluorescence spectroscopy are rapidly advancing. In this overview presentation we summarize some recent developments from this laboratory. Two and three-photon excitation have been observed for a wide variety of intrinsic and extrinsic fluorophores, including tryptophan, tyrosine, DNA stains, membrane probes, and even alkanes. It has been possible to observe multi-photon excitation of biopolymers without obvious photochemical or photo-thermal effects. Although not de-scribed in our lecture, another area of increasing interest is the use of engineered proteins for chemical and clinical sensing. We show results for the glucose-galactose binding protein from E. coli. The labeled protein shows spectral changes in response to micromolar concentrations of glucose. This protein was used with a novel sensing method based on the modulated emission of the labeled proteins and a long lifetime reference fluorophore. And finally, we describe a recently developed rhenium complex which displays a lifetime near 3 µs in oxygenated aqueous solution. Such long life-time probes allow detection of microsecond dynamic processes, bypassing the usual nanosecond timescale limit of fluorescence. The result of these developments in protein engineering, sensing methods, and metal-ligand probe chemistry will be the increased use of fluorescence in clinical chemistry and point-of-care analyses.