ABSTRACT
In condensed phase matter, the process of electronic excitation through the absorption of light commonly results in a system with an initially high degree of energetic instability. One of the most important and rapid means by which the system begins to accommodate its energy is a redistribution of excitation between the component optical centres (molecules or chromophores). The fundamental mechanism for this redistribution is the phenomenon of electronic energy transfer. At the molecular level this is a pairwise process in which the energy of electronic excitation held by one molecule transfers to another. As a result the former molecule, called the donor, imparts its energy of electronic excitation to the latter acceptor.
