Fire Resistance of Structural Materials: Steel, Concrete, and Timber
A special issue of Fire (ISSN 2571-6255). This special issue belongs to the section "Fire Risk Assessment and Safety Management in Buildings and Urban Spaces".
Deadline for manuscript submissions: 26 February 2027 | Viewed by 20
Special Issue Editor
Interests: architectural science; fire safety and engineering; sustainable buildings
Special Issues, Collections and Topics in MDPI journals
Special Issue Information
Dear Colleagues,
On 26 November 2025, a Level 5 fire—Hong Kong’s highest alarm level—broke out during refurbishment. Suspected to be fueled by flammable foamed facade and wind, it spread to 7 of 8 buildings. Over 2300 firefighters were deployed for rescue. As of 15 January 2026, 168 lives (including 1 firefighter) were lost.
The fire resistance of structural materials is a critical pillar of life safety and resilience in the built environment. As construction practices evolve with new materials and ambitious architectural designs, understanding and enhancing the behavior of steel, concrete, and timber under such big fires remains a paramount research challenge. This area is vital for developing safer, more efficient, and sustainable structures, especially with the growing use of mass timber in modern buildings.
This Special Issue aims to collate high-quality research and review articles that advance the fundamental and applied knowledge of the thermo-mechanical properties of structural materials during and after fire exposure. We seek to foster a collection of works that bridge the gap between material science, structural engineering, and fire engineering, contributing to the journal's scope of publishing innovative research in building materials and structural design under fires.
We welcome original research articles and reviews that address themes under big fires, including, but not limited to, the following: advanced fire testing methodologies; constitutive modeling and computational simulation of material degradation; the development and performance of innovative fire protection systems; and the assessment of post-fire residual capacity for rehabilitation. Contributions on performance-based design approaches and the fire behavior of hybrid structural systems are also highly encouraged.
Prof. Dr. W. K. Chow
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. 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.
Keywords
- fire resistance
- structural materials
- fire testing
- computational modeling
- performance-based design
- fire protection systems
- residual capacity
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