A single-photon sensitive synchroscan streak camera for room temperature picosecond emission dynamics of adenine and polyadenylic acid

It is experimentally verified that a synchroscan streak camera, incorporating a microchannel plate and synchronizing with UV picosecond pulses generated inside the cavity of a mode-locked CW ring dye laser, has enough sensitivity to detect picosecond emission phenomena in the region of a single-photon event. To demonstrate the usefulness of the synchroscan streak camera, the first measurement of time- and wavelength-resolved emissions in the picosecond region is successfully carried out for adenine and polyadenylic acid aqueous solutions at room temperature, and shows that their shortest lifetimes, due to the monomer fluorescence, are 6 and 8 ps, respectively.