For distance measurements the fluorescence relaxation was explored within pairwise interacting chemically identical, but photophysically different fluorescent groups. The recently developed theory (Kalinin, S. V.; et al. Spectrochim. Acta, Part A 2002, 58, 1087-1097) of partial donor-donor energy migration (PDDEM) was tested on lipid vesicles as a model system, which, for example, enables arrangement of a pH gradient between the inside and outside of the lipid bilayer. Time-correlated single-photon counting and steady-state fluorescence experiments were per-formed on mono- and bis-lipid derivatives of fluorescein solubilized in lipid bilayers. The PDDEM approach was successfully applied in the analyses of the different experiments. The distances extracted between the fluorescein groups of bis-fluorescein derivatives in lipid vesicles composed 1,2-dioleoyl-sn-glycero-3-phosphocholine and 1,2-dimyristoyl-sn-glycero-3-phosphocholine were found to be in reasonable agreement with independent measurements of the bilayer thickness.