This special issue of ZPC is dedicated to the 80th anniversary of Kev Salikhov, a prominent scientist who has made seminal contributions to spin chemistry, chemical kinetics, spin hyperpolarization and magnetic resonance. Altogether there are 41 scientific papers; for this reason, the guest editors have decided to publish three subsequent issues. Each issue is focused on a particular field, which is closely related to research interests of Salikhov or was even seeded by his work. As the following papers clearly demonstrate, the initial seed of Salikhov fell on a very fruitful soil and has grown to a huge and impressive scientific tree with branches ranging from fundamental science to applications in biochemistry and materials science
