Photochemistry and Photobiology

Thanks to recent advances in optical imaging and biomechanical techniques, fluorescence techniques such as FRET and fluorescence quenching have been greatly used to study and visualize the dynamic behavior of biomolecules in basic biological, biochemical and biomedical phenomena occurring in vitro and in vivo. Recently, non-B DNA as well as DNA (or B-DNA) are considered as excellent materials for building artificial nanostructures in nanotechnology, material science, molecular computing and bio-analysis. Thus, detailed information on the conformational dynamics and the biological functions of non-B DNA and DNA in vitro and in vivo is necessary for application in nano-biotechnology. Although their biological function and detailed conformation dynamics have not yet been clearly revealed, various spectroscopic techniques with a temporal and spatial resolution should lead to significant advances in understanding their conformational dynamics and the biological functions in vitro and in vivo. See the review “Reversible Conformational Switching of i-motif DNA Studied by Fluorescence Spectroscopy” by Jungkweon Choi and Tetsuro Majima on pages 513 – 522 in this issue.