Excited States and Reactions in Liquids

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In the beginning was the three star, one smile of ligh t across the empty face. Dylan Thomas (1) Excited states provide the chemist and biologist alike with suitable scapegoats with which they can at least qualitatively explain unusual data. T he central position occupied by excited states in photosynthesis, vision, laser technology, etc, cannot be denied, while the implication of energetic states in electro and chemiluminescence and oxidation reactions is only just coming to the forefront. From early beginnings, dealing mainly with the long-lived triplet state, it is now possible to observe excited states down to 10-12 sec by utilizing the advances made in technology over the past two decades. The object of this short review is to point out the advances and con­ tributions made by new techniques such as lasers and pulsed accelerators to both the mode of production and the understanding of the nature of excited states. The review will deal mainly with excited states in the liquid phase, with occasional reference to the gas and solid phases when these are ap­ propriate. Several books dealing with various aspects of excited states have been recently published : Theory and Interpretation of Fluorescence and Phos­ phorescence, R. Becker; Excitons in Molecular C rystals, D. P. Craig & S. H. Walmsley; Molecular Spectroscopy of the Tri plet State, S. P. McGlynn, T. Azumi & M. Kinoshita; Photoluminescence, C. A. Parker; the papers of two luminescence conference have also been published: Molecular Luminescence, edited by E. C. Lim; the Proceedings of the International Conference on Luminescence, edited by G. Szigeti; and The Chemistry of Ionisation and Ex­ citation, edited by G. R. A. Johnson & G. Scholes.