Photochemical upconversion in water

A major challenge remaining in photochemical upconversion lies in identifying appropriate chromophore combinations that function in pure water in the absence of hydrophobic hosts or surfactant additives. The current investigation achieves this goal using combinations of water soluble Ru(II) metal-to-ligand charge transfer (MLCT) sensitizers in concert with 9-anthracenecarboxylate (AnCO(2)(-)) and 1-pyrenecarboxylate (PyCO2-) in neat H2O.