title: Two-photon excitation of ethidium bromide labeled DNA.
abstract: We examined the steady state and time-resolved emission of DNA stained with ethidium bromide (EB) when excited with 90 fs pulses from a mode-locked titanium sapphire laser. Over the wavelength range from 840 to 880 nm EB-DNA was found to display two-photon excitation, with a cross-section near 7 x 10(-50) cm4s/photon. Frequency-domain intensity decay measurements revealed similar multi-exponential intensity decays for one- and two-photon excitation. Time-resolved anisotropy decay measurements revealed similar correlation times, but different amplitudes as has been observed previously for two- versus one-photon excitation. These results indicate that two-photon excitation of EB-DNA can be accomplished with the fundamental output of a Ti:sapphire laser without obvious heating or perturbation of the DNA.
authors.affiliation: Department of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology, University of Maryland School of Medicine, Baltimore 21201, USA.
authors.forename: H
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Malak
authors.forename: F N
authors.initials: FN
authors.lastname: Castellano
authors.forename: I
authors.initials: I
authors.lastname: Gryczynski
authors.forename: J R
authors.initials: JR
authors.lastname: Lakowicz
mesh_terms: D000818:Animals; D002417:Cattle; D004247:DNA / Q000737:chemistry*; D004996:Ethidium / Q000737:chemistry*; D005454:Fluorescence Polarization; D017785:Photons; D013050:Spectrometry, Fluorescence / Q000379:methods
chemical_list: D004247:DNA; D004996:Ethidium