Sustainable Functional Materials for Energy and Environmental Applications
A special issue of Materials (ISSN 1996-1944). This special issue belongs to the section "Catalytic Materials".
Deadline for manuscript submissions: 20 June 2026 | Viewed by 688
Special Issue Editor
Interests: functional materials; electrocatalysis; fluorescent; sensor; energy storage and conversion
Special Issues, Collections and Topics in MDPI journals
Special Issue Information
Dear Colleagues,
The world faces the interconnected challenges of securing a clean energy supply, mitigating climate change, and protecting our environment from an expanding array of pollutants. The transition to a sustainable circular economy is no longer an option but a necessity. At the forefront of this global effort lies the field of materials science, which holds the key to unlocking transformative technologies. The design and development of novel functional materials, engineered from the atomic level up for performance, durability, and sustainability, is paramount to our success.
This Special Issue will cover a wide spectrum of functional applications. We invite submissions focusing on key energy applications, such as advanced materials for energy generation and conversion (including photovoltaics, thermoelectrics, and catalysts for sustainable fuel production like water splitting, CO2 reduction, and fuel cells) and high-performance energy storage (like next-generation batteries, supercapacitors, and novel hydrogen storage solutions). Simultaneously, we seek contributions addressing critical environmental challenges, including materials for water remediation (novel adsorbents, advanced membranes, and catalysts for degrading pollutants), air purification and carbon capture (sorbents for CO2 capture and VOC removal), waste valorization (innovative catalysts for upcycling plastic and industrial waste), and functional materials for sensitive environmental sensing.
We invite researchers, scientists, and engineers from across academia and industry to contribute their latest breakthroughs. This Special Issue aims to serve as a benchmark resource, highlighting current progress, identifying future challenges, and inspiring new directions for developing the sustainable functional materials that will underpin our future.
Dr. Shun Lu
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. Materials 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 2600 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
- functional materials
- energy storage and conversion
- molecular activation
- sensors and actuators
- environmental science and engineering
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