TY - CONF A1 - Prakash, Swayam A1 - Bell, Jeremy A1 - Rurack, Knut T1 - Photophysical Understanding of Urobilin and its Zinc Complexes for Water Quality Testing N2 - Faecal contaminants in water are considered serious threats for human health, due to the presence of viruses, bacteria and other harmful microorganisms.1 Urobilin (UB) is a well-known faecal pigment and can be used as a marker for faecal matter in water.2 UB is commonly present in the urine of all mammals as the catabolic end product of bilirubin degradation.2 As the only simple chemical approach to its detection, Schlesinger’s test is usually used to enhance the weak fluorescence of UB in alcoholic media by complexation with Zinc.2, 3 The major limitation of this method is the only weak enhancement of the intrinsically weak UB fluorescence in aqueous media.3 This work presents an approach to introduce different Zn salts for improved fluorescence response, where we found a clear dependence of the fluorescence yield of UB-Zn(II) complexes on the counterion of the salt in water. By employing a combination of fluorescence parameters like transition energy, fluorescence intensity, and fluorescence lifetime, a photophysical understanding of the structure and conformation of the UB-Zn(II) complexes responsible for the fluorescence enhancement in water could be gained. The possibilities of developing a sensitive analytical method based on the acquired understanding are also discussed. T2 - Central European Conference on Photochemistry CECP 2024 CY - Bad Hofgastein, Austria DA - 18.02.2024 KW - Water analysis KW - Faecal contamination KW - Metal complexes KW - Fluorescence PY - 2024 AN - OPUS4-59874 LA - eng AD - Bundesanstalt fuer Materialforschung und -pruefung (BAM), Berlin, Germany ER -