Sustainable Smart Construction Materials

Dear Colleagues,

The depletion of natural resources, increase in greenhouse gas emissions, and rapidly growing challenges of industrial and construction waste management represent the major issues of urbanization. Such an alarming scenario has urged governments worldwide to seriously ponder over practical and worthy solutions which may conserve the natural resources and promote sustainable development around the globe. Developed countries are even stepping ahead by focusing and working with modern techniques and advancements. These techniques involve ‘green’ construction materials, zero energy buildings, durable infrastructures, and smart building materials. These advanced explorations also incorporate self-sensing and self-healing materials. Today, the ultimate objective of progressing towards smart cities involves the evolution of research in sustainable smart construction materials, which is the need of the hour.

Recently, many researchers are actively contributing towards the development of green construction materials, self-healing and self-sensing materials, piezoelectric materials, energy harvesting devices, thermal insulating composites, and fiber-reinforced composites which may be used for structural fabrication, repair and maintenance, and structural health monitoring. The use of both conventional and non-conventional materials is, thus, increasing steadily. New materials are being proposed or prepared for improved structural behavior. Likewise, recycling is also encouraged for minimizing waste and lowering the overall cost of structures. As a result, stronger, more durable, cost-effective, and sustainable materials are being developed, while the pursuit of further improvement is expected to advance the knowledge for smart cities.

The motivation behind this Special Issue is to share concepts, approaches, techniques, and deployment strategies on the improvement of smart construction materials, thereby ensuring prosperity, competitiveness, efficiency, and sustainability at various socioeconomic levels.

We encourage high-quality, original submissions of innovative research providing significant contributions to the theory and practice of sustainable and smart materials for the construction of building structures that are more efficient, resilient, cost-effective, and sustainable.

Dr. Muhammad Usman
Dr. Asad Hanif
Guest Editors

Manuscript Submission Information

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. All submissions that pass pre-check are peer-reviewed. Accepted papers will be published continuously in the journal (as soon as accepted) and will be listed together on the special issue website. Research articles, review articles as well as short 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 thoroughly refereed through a single-blind peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Smart Cities is an international peer-reviewed open access semimonthly journal published by MDPI.

Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 2000 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.

• smart cities
• sustainability
• smart materials
• sustainable materials
• cementitious composites
• green construction materials
• self-healing composites
• fiber-reinforced composites
• secondary raw materials
• self-sensing materials
• bio-inspired materials
• thermoelectric materials
• piezoelectric materials
• energy materials
• energy storage materials
• energy-efficient buildings