Two-photon brightness of highly fluorescent imidazopyridine derivatives: Two-photon and ultrafast transient absorption studies

Two-Photon Absorption and Multiphoton Excited Fluorescence of Acetamide-Chalcone Derivatives: The Role of Dimethylamine Group on the Nonlinear Optical and Photophysical Properties

This work studied the effect of different electron-withdrawing and electron-donating groups on the linear and nonlinear optical properties of acetamide-chalcone derivatives. The results showed that the addition of the dimethylamine group led to a large fluorescence emission (71% of fluorescence quantum yield in DMSO solution) that can be triggered by two and three-photon excitations, which is essential for biological applications. Furthermore, dimethylamine also red-shifts the lower energy state by approximately 90 nm, increasing the two-photon absorption cross-section of the lower energy band by more than 100% compared with the other studied compounds. All compounds presented two-electronic states observed through one and two-photon absorption spectroscopy and confirmed by Quantum Chemistry Calculations (QCCs). QCC results were also used to model the experimental two-photon absorption cross-sectional spectrum by the Sum-Over-States (SOS) approach, revealing a dependence between the coupling of the ground state with the first excited state and the transition dipole moment between these states.

Enhancement of optical properties of new purine nucleobases containing electron-donating and -withdrawing peripheral groups

Nowadays, a great deal of attention has been focused on synthesizing highly fluorescent unnatural base analogs. This has been motivated by the need to overcome the lack of fluorescence of nucleic acids' natural bases. Fluorescent unnatural base analogs, such as purines, may be used in several applications, such as DNA or RNA optical spectroscopy studies. Moreover, for purines base analogs, the optical properties, for example, emission, can be tunable through molecular engineering, improving their applications as fluorescent probes. Looking in this direction, the synthesis and optical spectroscopic studies of a new set of purines base analogs are of foremost relevance. Here, an increase in the fluorescence quantum yield was observed in molecules with NH-π-CN arrangement. The two-photon absorption (2PA) cross-sections also increased for the lower energy 2PA state. The enhancement of both properties results in a two-photon brightness of 5 and 10 times higher than in compounds lacking the NH-π-CN arrangement. For the higher energy 2PA state, an excited state absorption contribution to the 2PA cross-section values was observed, that was verified through ultrafast transient absorption measurements. The higher 2PA brightness makes the purines base analogs promising candidates as fluorescent probes in RNA and DNA spectroscopic studies.