Abstract

Oxyhemoglobin photolysis has been investigated with picosecond laser techniques. Transient light absorption changes observed within 500–600 nm reveal two processes following photodissociation: electronic relaxation up to 400 ps after dissociation and a partial religation during 3 ns. The kinetics of oxygen geminate recombination at pH 7 and 22°C has a monoexponential decay with a lifetime of 1.5 ns ± 0.1 ns.