- The Council of Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR) and National Physical Laboratory (NPL) developed an ink to combat the problem of fake printing of passports and counterfeiting of currency notes.
- The ink was produced based on single excitable dual emissive luminescent pigment.
- It was developed based on the concept of fluorescence and phosphorescence phenomena.
- Currently, the currency notes display only one color with the emission of wavelength.
- However, in the ink developed by the scientists features changes in pigment color after the notes are printed.
- In ambient light the ink shows white color.
- When the ink is exposed to UV light, it turns red and when the UV source is switched OFF it turns green.
Fluorescence and Phosphorescence
- Both in phosphorescence and fluorescence the radiation is electromagnetic and is spontaneous.
- In case of fluorescence, the radiation stops after the source is switched off.
- On the other hand, in phosphorescence, the glow continues for few hours.