and transducer to be structurally integrated. In luminescent/fluorescent chemosensing these two parts can be 'spaced' out or connected with a covalent spacer. The communication pathway is through electron transfer or energy transfer for such fluorescent chemosensors. The effectiveness of the host–guest recognition between the receptor and the analyte depends on several factors, including the design of the receptor moiety, which is objective is to match as much the nature of the structural nature of the target analyte, as well as the nature of the environment that the sensing event occurs within (e.g. the type of media, i.e. blood, saliva, urine, etc. in biological samples). An extension to this approach is the development of molecular beacons, which are oligonucleotide hybridization probes based on fluorescence signalling where the recognition or the sensing event is communicated through enhancement or reduction in luminescence through the use of Förster resonance energy transfer (FRET) mechanism. Fluorescent chemosensing All chemosensors are designed to contain a signalling moiety and a recognition moiety. These are integrated directly or connected with a short covalent spacer depending on the mechanism involved in the signalling event. The chemosensor can be based on self-assembly of the sensor and the analyte. An example of such a design are the (indicator) displacement assays IDA. IDA sensor for anions such as citrate or phosphate ions have been developed whereby these ions can displace a fluorescent indicator in an indicator-host complex. The so-called UT taste chip (University of Texas) is a prototype electronic tongue and combines supramolecular chemistry with charge-coupled devices based on silicon wafers and immobilized receptor molecules. Most examples of chemosensors for ions, such as those of alkali metal ions (Li+, Na+, K+, etc.) and alkali earth metal ions (Mg2+, Ca2+, etc.) are designed so that the excited state of the fluorophore component of the chemosensor is quenched by an electron transfer when the sensor is not complexed to these ions. No emission is thus observed, and the sensor is sometimes referred to as being 'switched off'. By complexing the sensor with a cation, the conditions for electron transfer are altered so that the quenching process is blocked, and fluorescence emission is 'switched on'. The probability of PET is governed by the overall free energy of the system (the Gibbs free energy ΔG). The driving force for PET is represented by ΔGET, the overall changes in the free energy for the electron transfer can be