Cutting-Edge Advances in Bacterial Sensing

Dear Colleagues,

The recent emergence of pathogenic and multidrug-resistant bacteria is becoming a major global health concern. The World Health Organization (WHO) has already issued pertinent warnings that infections caused by multidrug-resistant bacteria are rapidly increasing every year and are projected to become one of the leading causes of death worldwide. Therefore, it is essential to develop innovative bacterial sensing technologies and next-generation diagnostic tools to ensure and safeguard global human health, food safety, and water and environmental resources.

Sensitive, reliable, and timely detection of bacterial pathogens is critical for the early diagnosis of infectious diseases, outbreak control, and hygiene monitoring in healthcare, food safety and processing, and environmental and water quality assessment. Optical sensing techniques are powerful platforms for non-invasive and high-throughput bacterial detection. Electrochemical sensors, in particular, have gained significant attention for their ability to rapidly and reliably detect a wide range of bacterial pathogens for various applications.

The hybridization and integration of transducers and various device components have further expanded the analytical landscape by combining specificity with the speed and versatility of modern signal processing systems. One of the most exciting developments in this field is the incorporation of sensing platforms into wearable, portable, and smartphone-compatible devices. These innovations enable decentralized testing outside traditional laboratory settings, making them especially valuable for point-of-care diagnostics and low-resource environments and remote areas. Flexible, wearable, printable, and paper-based sensors, together with microfluidic and lateral flow approaches, have opened new avenues for creating low-cost, disposable systems that can be mass-produced and widely deployed.

This Special Issue aims to showcase cutting-edge research advancements by inviting contributions that explore novel bacterial sensing strategies with the goal of introducing and advancing further developments in this field. Original research papers, reviews, and perspective articles are all welcome.

Dr. Baljit Singh
Guest Editor

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 250 words) can be sent to the Editorial Office for assessment.

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. Bacteria is an international peer-reviewed open access quarterly journal published by MDPI.

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