The position of their electronic spectra depends strongly on the polarity of the solvent. We measured the dipole moments of the dyes in the equilibrium ground state and the Franck-Condon excited state. In mixtures of neutral nonpolar toluene with aprotic polar dimethylsulfoxide, we observe inhomogeneous broadening of the electronic spectra for the indicated compounds, due to fluctuations in solution of the intermolecular interaction energy. The time-resolved characteristics of fluorescence obtained suggest formation of an intermolecular hydrogen bond between the dye and the surrounding medium in a toluene-ethanol mixture. We measured the Raman spectra of CPET and CPMR in different organic solvents. The most intense lines in the 1582-1591 cm -1 region can be assigned to stretching of the phenyl rings of the molecules; the lines in the 831-842 cm -1 region can be assigned to a cyclopentanone ring mode; the lines at 1186-1195 cm -1 can be assigned to stretching of the =C-C-bond of the phenyl ring and rocking of the H atoms of the phenyl ring. We have observed that the position and width of the lines for the stretching vibrations of the ketocyanines depend substantially on the polarity of the surrounding medium.The studied dyes can be used as probes for studying different biological systems by site-selective laser spectroscopy and Raman spectroscopy. The fact that these two methods can be used simultaneously for diagnostics of biosystems is an important advantage of ketocyanine dyes compared with other known probes.Key words: fluorescence spectroscopy, spontaneous Raman scattering, ketocyanine dyes, inhomogeneous broadening of spectra, hydrogen bond.Introduction. Fluorescent probes have been increasingly intensively used for more and more diverse purposes in physics, chemistry, biology, and medicine, since such probes make it possible to solve a number of complicated and important problems [1]. The fluorescent probes themselves have also been perfected, and new spectral effects are used for analysis of the microcharacteristics of the environment. Fluorescent probes have been previously synthesized containing distinct electron density donor and acceptors, most often amino and carbonyl groups. Many such dipolar compounds (naphthalenes, phthalimides, anthracenes, etc.) have found broad application in analysis of molecular structure relaxation in simple solutions and biological macromolecules [2][3][4][5]. The indicated compounds are characterized by a significant change in the charge distribution in the excited electronic state, occurring on a femtosecond to nanosecond time scale. From the position of the fluorescence spectrum, its Stokes shift, the lifetime of the excited state, the emission anisotropy kinetics, and other characteristics, we can obtain information about the polarity, viscosity, dynamics of nearest-neighbor molecules and their segments in the environment of the probe, the presence, nature, and size of the charge on the ions.