Singlet-oxygen generation at gas-liquid interfaces: a significant artifact in the measurement of singlet-oxygen yields from ozone-biomolecule reactions.

Several ozone-biomolecule reactions have previously been shown to generate singlet oxygen in high yields. For some of these ozone-biomolecule reactions, we now show that the apparent singlet-oxygen yields determined from measurements of 1270 nm chemiluminescence were artifactually elevated by production of gas-phase singlet oxygen. The gas-phase singlet oxygen results from the reaction of gas-phase ozone with biomolecules near the surface of the solution. Through the use of a flow system that excludes air from the reaction chamber, accurate singlet-oxygen yields can be obtained. The revised singlet-oxygen yields (mol 1O2 per mol O3) for the reactions of ozone with cysteine, reduced glutathione, NADH, NADPH, human albumin, methionine, uric acid and oxidized glutathione are 0.23 +/- 0.02, 0.26 +/- 0.2, 0.48 +/- 0.04, 0.41 +/- 0.01, 0.53 +/- 0.06, 1.11 +/- 0.04, 0.73 +/- 0.05 and 0.75 +/- 0.01, respectively. These revised singlet-oxygen yields are still substantial.