The topic of fluorescence‐based chemical sensing relies on a broad range of fundamental chemical phenomena, and has far‐reaching applications in diverse research areas including environmental chemistry, medical imaging, and national security. This field requires an interested researcher to understand underlying chemical phenomena in supramolecular chemistry and non‐covalent interactions, and to use that understanding to develop new fluorescent probes with improved properties, to demonstrate how new and old probes can be used in high‐impact situations, and to continuously work to meet unmet challenges in chemical detection.

This topic has been relevant for decades, and recent current events highlight its continued relevance. For example, the COVID‐19 pandemic highlights a need for rapid, sensitive, and selective sensing of the virus in indoor settings, to limit the spread of the virus; in biological fluids, to detect individuals' antibody levels and concomitant immunity; and in a variety of other scenarios. In another example, the 2021 oil spill in the Mediterranean Sea highlights a need for improved sensing of oil spills, particularly before the pollutants reach land; for monitoring of the air, water, and sediment on affected coastlines, to determine the safety of these coastlines for residents and visitors; and for detection of pollutants and pollutant degradation products in aquatic species, both for determining food safety of these species and for monitoring the overall health of the ecosystem.

To that end, we are pleased to present this special issue of the Israel Journal of Chemistry, on the important and timely topic of “Fluorescent Molecular Probes and Fluorescence‐Based Chemical Sensing.” This issue includes both timely and comprehensive review articles as well as communications and articles reporting new research results. The articles focus on chemical sensors derived from spirolactam‐rhodamine photoswitches (A. Lippert and co‐workers); on the fluorescence‐based sensing of phosphate‐containing biomolecules (A. Nag and co‐workers); on photo‐triggered and photo‐calibrated nitric oxide donors (Yang and co‐workers); and on using fluorescence to understand and improve foldamer function (Fuller and co‐workers). Additional new research reported herein focuses on ester‐functionalized TCF‐based fluorescent probes for bacterial detection (T. James and co‐workers), on the development and application of a benzothiazole‐phenothiazine based molecular probe (Govindaraju and co‐workers), and on a method for the thionation of a phosphaquinolin‐2‐one scaffold, with applications in the synthesis of novel fluorescent probes (D. Johnson and co‐workers).

Work from both of our research groups is also included herein, with reports of the development of cyclodextrin‐bimane complexes for iodine detection (M. Levine and co‐workers) and of a new method for the fluorescent labelling of cell surface proteins on a solid support (D. Margulies and co‐workers).

Overall, we are pleased that the authors included in this special issue demonstrate strong geographic diversity, with locations in the United States, Europe, Israel, and Asia; strong gender diversity, with a significant percentage of female corresponding authors; and strong career diversity, with articles from assistant, associate, and full professors. We believe wholeheartedly that such diversity strongly enhances the scientific merit of this special issue and benefits the chemistry community as a whole.

We hope that researchers in this community will refer to the articles included herein to advance their own research objectives and continue to solve unmet societal challenges in chemistry detection research.

With best wishes for continued research progress,

基于荧光的化学传感主题依赖于广泛的基本化学现象，并且在包括环境化学，医学成像和国家安全在内的各种研究领域中具有深远的应用。这个领域需要感兴趣的研究人员了解超分子化学和非共价相互作用中潜在的化学现象，并利用这种理解来开发具有改进性能的新型荧光探针，以证明新探针和旧探针如何在高影响力的情况下使用，并不断努力以应对化学检测中尚未解决的挑战。

这个主题已经有数十年的历史了，最近的时事凸显了它的持续意义。例如，COVID-19大流行强调了对室内环境中病毒的快速，灵敏和选择性感测的需要，以限制病毒的传播。在生物液体中，以检测个人的抗体水平和伴随的免疫力；以及其他各种情况。在另一个例子中，2021年在地中海发生的漏油事件突出表明，需要改进对漏油事件的感知，尤其是在污染物到达陆地之前；监测受影响海岸线上的空气，水和沉积物，以确定这些海岸线对居民和游客的安全性；用于检测水生物种中的污染物和污染物降解产物，

为此，我们很高兴介绍《以色列化学杂志》的这一期特刊，主题是“荧光分子探针和基于荧光的化学传感”这一重要而及时的主题。本期包括及时和全面的评论文章，以及交流和报道新研究成果的文章。文章重点介绍了由螺内酰胺-若丹明光电开关衍生的化学传感器（A. Lippert及其同事）；基于荧光的含磷酸盐生物分子的检测（A. Nag及其同事）；用光触发和光校准的一氧化氮供体（杨及其同事）；以及使用荧光来理解和改善折叠器功能（Fuller和同事）。本文报道的其他新研究集中于用于细菌检测的酯基官能化TCF基荧光探针（T.

我们两个研究小组的工作也都包括在内，并报道了用于检测碘的环糊精-二马胺配合物（M. Levine和他的同事）的发展，以及在固体上对细胞表面蛋白进行荧光标记的新方法的报道。支持（D. Margulies和同事）。

总体而言，我们很高兴看到本期特刊中的作者表现出强大的地域多样性，并在美国，欧洲，以色列和亚洲设有办事处。强大的性别多样性，相当多的女性通讯作者；以及强大的职业多样性，并有来自助理教授，副教授和正教授的文章。我们衷心相信，这种多样性极大地增强了这一特殊问题的科学价值，并使整个化学界受益。

我们希望该社区中的研究人员可以参考本文中包含的文章，以提高他们自己的研究目标，并继续解决化学检测研究中未解决的社会挑战。

衷心祝愿研究工作不断发展，