The effect of molecular organisation in DNA oligomers studied by femtosecond fluorescence spectroscopy

Organisation lengthens life! The first fluorescence investigation of DNA oligomers performed with femtosecond resolution revealed that organisation of nucleotides into single strands, and further into double strands, makes the fluorescence decays slower and slower (see graph). This is important because a longer lifetime increases the reactivity of the excited states and, thus, the probability of inducing damage to the double helix.