As potential chemiluminescent probe for singlet oxygen, the furonaphthalimide 4 was synthesized in five steps (ca. 25% overall yield), by starting from commercially available 4-chloro-1,8-naphthalic anhydride, its photooxygenation at -10-degrees-C gave the cleavage product 6 of the intermediary dioxetane 5. which is thermally too labile for isolation and could not be detected even by low temperature NMR spectroscopy. The new 1,8-naphthalimide derivatives 3, 4 and 6 were fully characterized and their absorption and fluorescence spectral properties were determined.