Fluorescence Dynamics of Monocyclodextrin– and Bis(thiol‐cyclodextrin)–Coumarin C153 Complexes

The solvation and confinement of coumarin C153 within supramolecular host/guest complexes based on β-cyclodextrin (β-CD) and 6-deoxy-6-thio-β-cyclodextrin (β-CD-SH) in water are studied by fluorescence spectroscopy. For β-CD/C153, the 1:1 complex is proposed, and for β-CD-SH/C153 both the 1:1 and 2:1 complexes are believed to be formed. The 2:1 β-CD-SH/C153 complex has an association constant of 4.2×10(5)  M(-1) and a C153 population of 82 %, which are interestingly high values, indicating that the proposed β-CD-SH dimers structure are connected by covalent disulfide bonds; this is supported by mass spectrometry. Solvation related to fast hydrogen-bond rearrangement as a part of fluorescence relaxation is determined by the ultrafast components of time-resolved spectroscopy to be 3 and 7 ps for the 1:1 β-CD/C153 and 2:1 β-CD-SH/C153 complexes, respectively.