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Functional Nanomaterials for Environmental Remediation and Ecotoxicity Assessment

A special issue of Molecules (ISSN 1420-3049). This special issue belongs to the section "Nanochemistry".

Deadline for manuscript submissions: 31 July 2025 | Viewed by 1041

Special Issue Editors


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Guest Editor
Department of Chemistry, University of Scranton, 800 Linden Street, Scranton, PA 18510, USA
Interests: nanomaterials; colloids; surface chemistry; photocatalysis, polymers, drug-delivery, nanoparticles; materials chemistry; metal oxides; semiconductors; sensors; optoelectronics; nanofabrication

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Guest Editor

Special Issue Information

Dear Colleagues,

Nanomaterials are important owing to their optical, magnetic, and electrical properties. These properties make nanomaterials fantastic candidates for photocatalysis and sensing.

Photocatalysis is defined as a change in the rate of a photochemical reaction by the activation of a semiconductor photocatalyst with sunlight or artificial light (ultraviolet or visible radiation). This capability can be leveraged to photo-degrade pollutants in environmental remediation efforts as we design smart self-cleaning materials. On the other hand, the strong optical and magnetic responses of metal oxides, along with their biocompatibility, also make them powerful candidates for sensing heavy metal ions and other toxic components in the environment.

The common limitations of photocatalysts are their high rate of recombination of photogenerated electron–hole pairs or their low absorption of radiation in the visible range, while nanomaterials in sensing suffer from a lack of sensitivity and specificity. Therefore, the search for new functional materials with improved properties has attracted the interest of researchers and innovative solutions are being explored via new organic–inorganic hybrids, mixed metal oxides, doping, and the fabrication of composite architectures.

In this context, this Special Issue, entitled Functional Nanomaterials for Environmental Remediation and Ecotoxicity Assessment, will bring together recent developments in the field of new nanomaterials for photocatalytic and sensing applications.

The articles presented in this Special Issue will cover various topics, such as the following:

  • Synthesis and characterization of metal oxides in different areas:
    • Nanomaterials and composite materials ;
    • Metals, metal chalcogenides, and polymers;
    • Physical methods for characterization;
    • Green synthesis.
  • Properties of nanomaterials in different areas:
    • Optical properties;
    • Electrical properties;
    • Magnetic properties;
    • Sensing properties;
    • Biotoxicity.
  • Applications of nanomaterials in different areas:
    • Pollutant degradation;
    • Wastewater and air treatment;
    • Optical and magnetic sensing;
    • Biosensing;
    • Others.
  • Critical reviews and perspectives on functional nanomaterial synthesis and applications.

Dr. Riddhiman Medhi
Prof. Dr. Yucheng Lan
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. Molecules 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 2700 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

  • nanomaterials
  • environmental remediation
  • sensing
  • ecotoxicity
  • synthesis
  • photocatalysis
  • semiconductor
  • magnetic
  • optical

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Published Papers (1 paper)

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Research

18 pages, 9315 KiB  
Article
Anisotropic Microparticles with a Controllable Structure via Soap-Free Seeded Emulsion Polymerization
by Yanping Duan, Xia Zhao, Xiang Nan, Zhifeng Sun, Xiaoyun Lei, Wei Wang, Hong Hao and Jianfang Li
Molecules 2025, 30(1), 166; https://doi.org/10.3390/molecules30010166 - 3 Jan 2025
Viewed by 782
Abstract
Anisotropic particles have a wide range of applications in materials science such as emulsion stabilization, oil–water separation, and catalysis due to their asymmetric structure and properties. Nevertheless, designing and synthesizing large quantities of anisotropic particles with controlled morphologies continue to present considerable challenges. [...] Read more.
Anisotropic particles have a wide range of applications in materials science such as emulsion stabilization, oil–water separation, and catalysis due to their asymmetric structure and properties. Nevertheless, designing and synthesizing large quantities of anisotropic particles with controlled morphologies continue to present considerable challenges. In this study, we successfully synthesized anisotropic microspheres using a soap-free seed emulsion polymerization method. This approach combines the benefits of seed emulsion polymerization with emulsion interfacial polymerization. By varying the concentrations of dissolved polymeric monomers, 3-methacryloyloxypropyltrimethoxysilane (MPS), and the initiator of potassium persulfate (KPS), different shapes of bowl, cap, and three-sided concave particles were obtained in surfactant-free aqueous solutions, simplifying the post-treatment process. The cap particles are Janus particles with good emulsion stability to toluene/water emulsions over 30 days. The catalytic degradation of 4-nitrophenol (4-NP) was investigated after loading silver nanoparticles on the surface of the particles by in situ deposition. The anisotropic particles obtained in this work have potential applications in emulsion stabilization and catalysis. Full article
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