Photophysics of xanthene dyes in surfactant solution

The spectral (both absorption and fluorescence) and photoelectrochemical studies of some anionic xanthene dyes namely erythrosine B, rose bengal and eosin have been carried out in micellar solution of cationic cetyl trimethyl ammonium bromide (CTAB), anionic sodium dodecyl sulphate (SDS) and neutral triton X-100 (TX-100). The results show that all these dyes form 1:1 electron-donor-acceptor (EDA) or charge-transfer (CT) complexes with TX-100, which acts as an electron donor. There is no interaction of these dyes with SDS, whereas the interaction with CTAB is mainly electrostatic in nature. In presence of TX-100, these dyes show enhancement of fluorescence intensity with a red shift and develop photovoltage in a photoelectrochemical cell. A good correlation has been found among the photovoltage generation in the systems consisting of these dyes and TX-100, spectral shift due to complex formation and thermodynamic properties of these complexes.