The small molecule fluorescent probes for gasotransmitters

In the biological system, there are various gas molecules, which play key roles in the system. Specially, NO, CO and H 2 S are recognized as gasotransmitters, involving in the signal transduction and related biological events. Even though remarkable advance in the field has been made these years, the roles of gasotransmitters in the biological systems are not fully understood. For further exploration of the functions of gasotransmitters, fast, high selective and high sensitive analysis and imaging methods are highly required. Development on these methods has become an important cross discipline among chemical biology, bioinorganic chemistry, pharmacy and medicine. The current review focuses on the development of the small molecule fluorescent probes for gasotransmitters in recent years, and hopefully this work would attract the interest of the field.