The dynamics of solvation of an excited chromophore in pure water and in a restricted space with a limited number of water molecules have been studied. The time-dependent Stokes shift of Coumarin 480 (C480) and Coumarin 460 (C460) were measured using femtosecond fluorescence upconversion and time-correlated singlephoton-counting techniques. The system with a limited number of water molecules was an inclusion complex of Coumarin dyes with y-cyclodextrin (yCD). The results of molecular dynamics simulations are compared with the observed solvent response in pure water and in the yCD cavity. The observed relaxation times range from < fs to 1.2 ns. Solvation of C480 in pure water is observed to occur with time constants of <50 and 310 fs. In sharp contrast with the solvation response in pure water, in the case of the C48O/yCD inclusion complex, additional long solvation time constants of 13, 109 and 1200 ps are observed. The stoichiometry, structure and dynamics of the CoumarinlyCD complexes are also discussed.

Ionic liquids are an emerging class of materials with a diverse and extraordinary set of properties. Understanding the origins of these properties and how they can be controlled by design to serve valuable practical applications presents a wide array of challenges and opportunities to the chemical physics and physical chemistry community. We highlight here some of the significant progress already made and future research directions in this exciting area.

Ultrafast excited state structural dynamics of [Cu I (dmp) 2 ] + (dmp = 2,9-dimethyl-1,10-phenanthroline) have been studied to identify structural origins of transient spectroscopic changes during the photoinduced metal-to-ligand-charge-transfer (MLCT) transition that induces an electronic configuration change from Cu(I) (3d 10 ) to Cu(II) (3d 9 ). This study has important connections with the flattening of the Franck-Condon state tetrahedral geometry and the ligation of Cu(II)* with the solvent observed in the thermally equilibrated MLCT state by our previous laser-initiated time-resolved x-ray absorption spectroscopy (LITR-XAS) results. To better understand the structural photodynamics of