Fluorescence Spectroscopy: Where We Are and Where We’re Going

Fluorescence, phosphorescence and chemiluminescence spectroscopies have established themselves as safe and ultrasensitive analytical techniques. However, the luminescence spectroscopies of today have moved well beyond the simple lamp, monochromator, sample compartment and detector arrangements of three or four decades ago, to very sophisticated electronic and optical instruments and some very elegant chemical and biochemical techniques and have drawn heavily on some of the most sophisticated physical and chemical theory for their current status. In this paper will be described some of the instrumentation and chemistry that have contributed to making luminescence spectroscopy one of the most powerful weapons in the chemist’s and biochemist’s arsenal and some of those approaches that will lead the way of this subject into the near future.