Special Issue "Advancing Coatings with Biotechnology"

Guest Editor
Prof. Dr. Michael C. Flickinger
1 Department of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering, North Carolina State University, Campus Box 7905, Raleigh, NC 27695-7905, USA
2 Golden LEAF Biomanufacturing Training & Education Center, North Carolina State University, Campus Box 7928, Raleigh, NC 27695-7928, USA
Website: http://www.che.ncsu.edu/people/faculty-pages/flickinger.html
E-Mail: michael_flickinger@ncsu.edu
Phone: +1 919 513 0872
Fax: +1 919 515 34 65
Interests: Bioprocess Intensification and Miniaturization (BIM); bioreactive materials; biocatalytic coatings; biopreservation; nano-structured biocatalytic coatings and microbial inks; microbial biocatalyst engineering; biocoating reactor engineering

Dear Colleagues,

Biotechnology has revolutionized many industries.  It will dramatically impact the coating industry as well by creating biocoatings with functionality far beyond today’s polymer coatings. A special issue of Coatings combining biotechnology and coatings has never before been published. This issue will highlight advances in colloid and polymer materials, enzyme and microbial biotechnology that will dramatically transform the functionality of waterborne coatings using the selectivity and reactivity of biology.  Biocoatings have been demonstrated in laboratory studies that preserve and stabilize the reactivity of enzymes, biomolecules (pigments, nucleic acids, proteins) or reactive microbes (bacteria, yeast, fungi, archea, algae) for hundreds to thousands of hours. Biocoatings can react to chemicals in the environment and degrade toxins; others are photoreactive producing or consuming gasses using solar energy.  Some can be used as biocatalysts for chiral chemical transformations in aqueous or multi-phase systems, while others sense their environment (color change, luminesce, fluoresce) or self-tune to incident light intensity.  There is a very significant gap between these academic demonstrations and the information needed for development of commercial biocoatings.  Methods are needed for waterborne biocoating formulation, drying/curing without inactivation, wet adhesion, and optimization of nanoporosity.  Modeling of the porosity, stability and reactivity of single or multi-component biocoatings is lacking.  Close collaboration is needed between academic and industrial developers in the next 5 to 10 years to establish standards for measuring coating safety and stability for biocoatings to become commercial products proven in the market.  This issue will highlight both the advances and the many challenges for commercial development of coatings utilizing biotechnology.  Please contact me if you wish to discuss your contribution to this first special issue on Advancing Coatings with Biotechnology.

Prof. Michael C. Flickinger
Guest Editor

Submission

Manuscripts should be submitted online at www.mdpi.com by registering and logging in to this website. Once you are registered, click here to go to the submission form. Manuscripts can be submitted until the deadline. Papers will be published continuously (as soon as accepted) and will be listed together on the special issue website. Research articles, review articles as well as communications are invited. For planned papers, a title and short abstract (about 100 words) can be sent to the Editorial Office for announcement on this website.

Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are refereed through a peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Coatings is an international peer-reviewed Open Access quarterly journal published by MDPI.

Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. For the first couple of issues the Article Processing Charge (APC) will be waived for well-prepared manuscripts. English correction and/or formatting fees of 250 CHF (Swiss Francs) will be charged in certain cases for those articles accepted for publication that require extensive additional formatting and/or English corrections.

• reactive enzyme coatings
• biocatalytic coatings
• photoreactive biocoatings
• biocatalytic plastics
• waterborne biocoatings
• smart coatings using biotechnology
• bioreactive polymer coatings