Electron transfer-based single molecule fluorescence as a probe for nano-environment dynamics

Abstract

Electron transfer (ET) is one of the most important elementary processes that takes place in fundamental aspects of biology, chemistry, and physics. In this review, we discuss recent research on single molecule probes based on ET. We review some applications, including the dynamics of glass-forming systems, surface binding events, interfacial ET on semiconductors, and the external field-induced dynamics of polymers. All these examples show that the ET-induced changes of fluorescence trajectory and lifetime of single molecules can be used to sensitively probe the surrounding nano-environments. © 2014 by the authors; licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland.