The discovery of visible fluorescence in the plant pigments betalains revealed the existence of fluorescent patterns in flowers of plants of the order Caryophyllales, where betalains substitute anthocyanins. The serendipitous initial discovery led to a systemized characterization of the role of different substructures on the photophysical phenomenon. Strong fluorescence is general to all members of the family of betaxanthins linked to the structural property that the betalamic acid moiety is connected to an amine group. This property has led to bioinspired tailor-made probes and to the development of novel biotechnological applications in screening techniques or microscopy labeling. Here, we comprehensively review the photophysics, photochemistry, and photobiology of betalain fluorescence and describe all current applications.

植物色素甜菜碱中可见荧光的发现表明，在石竹科植物的花中存在荧光模式，其中甜菜碱替代花青素。偶然的最初发现导致了对不同亚结构在光物理现象上的作用的系统化表征。虾青素家族的所有成员都具有强荧光，这与将其连接的金属特性（该特性是将BeM的部分连接到一个氨基基）上。这种特性导致了具有生物启发性的量身定制的探针，并导致了筛选技术或显微镜标记中新型生物技术应用的发展。在这里，我们全面回顾了甜菜碱荧光的光物理，光化学和光生物学，并描述了所有当前的应用。