Fluorescent Probes: synthesis and Investigation of their use in Recognition of Anions and Cations and Biomolecules.

Abstract

Development of molecular probes for the selective and sensitive detection of analytes has been an active area of research because such effective molecules can have biological and medicinal applications. Of the various probes reported, the fluorescence based systems have attracted much attention owing to their high sensitivity, fast response time, non–invasiveness and technical simplicity. However, the quantification of a target analyte using the fluorescent probe that acts through a single emission response (either increase or decrease in the fluorescence intensity) can have disadvantages, when compared to the systems that show either dual emission or ratiometric changes. In the case of the systems that exhibit ratiometric changes, the ratio of the fluorescence intensity of the two different wavelengths can be utilized for the quantification of the analyte of interest. Such an observation will have an effective internal referencing that greatly increases the sensitivity of the detection. In this context, it was our objective to develop functional organic systems and to explore their potential as sensitive fluorescent probes for the recognition of anions, cations and biomolecules. The present thesis has been divided into four chapters and of which the first chapter gives an overview on the organic fluorescent probes, with a particular emphasis on their mechanism of molecular recognition. In addition, the specific objectives of the present thesis were also briefly described at the end of this chapter.