ELECTRONIC-ENERGY TRANSFER IN CONCENTRATED MICELLAR SOLUTIONS

A problem of electronic energy transfer among chromophores solubilized in a micellar solution is addressed theoretically with the emphasis on the intermicellar interactions. Using the formalism of characteristic functions, a general method is advanced for determining the distribution of distance between two molecules located in separate spherical micelles. Averaging the microscopic decay over the pair distance distribution function is the key step in relating the macroscopic observables to the underlying structure of the embedding space if the irreversible direct energy transfer between two chemically distinct species is considered. The problem of excitation transport among identical chromophores can also be formulated to a good approximation as a superposition of pairwise interactions. Analytical solutions to the distance distribution function as well as the corresponding configurationally averaged energy transfer observables are presented for several spatial arrangements of practical importance. Applications to concentrated micellar solutions and to clusters of micelles are discussed. © 1995 American Institute of Physics.