Fluorescence quenching of uric acid solubilized in bicontinuous microemulsion by nitrobenzene

: Uric Acid is known to be practically insoluble in aqueous and alcoholic media. However, it exhibits a reasonable solubility in a Bicontinuous Microemulsion system – a 15-fold or more increase in solubility in this system compared to its solubility in water. The bicontinuous microemulsion is made up of three components –Dodecane-Surfactant-water. Uric acid solubilized in this system is quenched by nitrobenzene. The obtained fluorescence data do not obey the Stern-Volmer equation when plotted accordingly. Therefore, the modified Stern-Volmer equation was used to analyze the data. It was observed that only one third (1/3) of uric acid is accessible to quenching in this medium and the reaction is diffusion-limited. The Stern-Volmer quenching constant, KSV, was calculated to be 130 M-1 and the fluorescence lifetime, 0, the quantum yield, , and the bimolecular quenching rate constant, kq, were calculated as 10.6 nanoseconds, 0.06 and 1.23 1010 M-1s-1, respectively.