Abstract

In total internal reflection conditions, light penetrates into materials with lower refractive index from a glass plate with a higher one. This is called an evanescent wave and can be used as excitation or probe beams for surface and interface spectroscopic studies. We developed two time- resolved methods, fluorescence spectroscopy which measures selectively the fluorescence from the interface layer, and absorption spectroscopy by using the evanescent light as a probe beam.

© 1990 Optical Society of America