Fire Safety and Structural Performance of Wood and Sustainable Building Materials Including Their Composites

Dear Colleagues,

Recently, there has been growing global interest in sustainable construction using materials with a low environmental footprint, leading to an increase in the use of wood, wood-based materials, and other biomaterials in residential, commercial, and industrial buildings. Engineered wood products—such as cross-laminated timber (CLT), glued laminated timber (Glulam), laminated veneer lumber (LVL), and various composites made from natural fiber materials—are increasingly recognized for their low carbon footprint, renewability, and exceptional structural properties, making them a suitable alternative to other building materials. However, for fire safety reasons, the wider use of wood and other sustainable building materials is limited by normative provisions in building regulations.

The flammability of wood, wood-based products and their composites requires thorough investigation of ignition, charring behavior, fire resistance, structural response at elevated temperatures, and the influence of material treatments and protective systems that can increase the fire resistance of building materials made from these components.  At the same time, innovative composite systems and various hybrid solutions bring additional complexities that require modern, scientifically based assessment methods. To promote the use of sustainable materials in construction, research in the field of fire safety is essential and is rapidly expanding thanks to advances in materials science, experimental testing, fire engineering, and numerical modeling.

This Special Issue aims to bring together the latest research in the field of fire safety of modified wood, wood composites, and biomaterials. It will include the results of fire tests at all scales, fire dynamics, thermal properties, structural performance, numerical modeling, and fire engineering with the aim of disseminating scientifically based evidence to support fire safety designs. 

This Special Issue welcomes original research articles and peer-reviewed contributions on topics including, but not limited to:

- Structural performance and thermal analysis;

- Fire testing (fire characteristics);

- Fire prevention;

- Fire resistance;

- Fire engineering;

- Numerical modeling. 

Dr. Patrik Mitrenga
Dr. Linda Makovická-Osvaldová
Dr. Kateřina Hájková
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 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-anonymized peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Fire is an international peer-reviewed open access monthly 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 2400 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.

• fire prevention
• wood composite
• wood modification
• fire resistance
• testing
• thermal degradation
• fire engineering