Announcements

The purpose of our Best Paper Awards is to promote and recognize the most impactful contributions published within MDPI journals.

The academic editors of each journal carefully selected reviews and research papers through a rigorous judging process based on criteria such as the scientific merit, overall impact, and the quality of presentation of the papers published in the journal.

We are honored to present the winners in the “Engineering” category, who were selected amongst extensive competition, and congratulate the authors for their outstanding scientific publications.

Actuators:

• “Position Control of Pneumatic Actuators Using Three-Mode Discrete-Valued Model Predictive Control”
  by Haitao Qi, Gary M. Bone and Yile Zhang
  Actuators 2019, 8(3), 56; doi: 10.3390/act8030056
• “Review of Electrothermal Actuators and Applications”
  by Alissa Potekhina and Changhai Wang
  Actuators 2019, 8(4), 69; doi: 10.3390/act8040069

Batteries:

• “Pre-Lithiation Strategies for Rechargeable Energy Storage Technologies: Concepts, Promises and Challenges”
  by Florian Holtstiege, Peer Bärmann, Roman Nölle, Martin Winter and Tobias Placke
  Batteries 2018, 4(1), 4; doi: 10.3390/batteries4010004
• “A Critical Review of Lithium-Ion Battery Recycling Processes from a Circular Economy Perspective”
  by Omar Velázquez-Martínez, Johanna Valio, Annukka Santasalo-Aarnio, Markus Reuter and Rodrigo Serna-Guerrero
  Batteries 2019, 5(4), 68; doi: 10.3390/batteries5040068
• “Critical Review of the Use of Reference Electrodes in Li-Ion Batteries: A Diagnostic Perspective”
  by Rinaldo Raccichini, Marco Amores and Gareth Hinds
  Batteries 2019, 5(1), 12; doi: 10.3390/batteries5010012
• “Life Cycle Analysis of Lithium-Ion Batteries for Automotive Applications”
  by Qiang Dai, Jarod C. Kelly, Linda Gaines and Michael Wang
  Batteries 2019, 5(2), 48; doi 10.3390/batteries5020048
• “Design Strategies for High Power vs. High Energy Lithium Ion Cells”
  by Michael J. Lain, James Brandon and Emma Kendrick
  Batteries 2019, 5(4), 64; doi: 10.3390/batteries5040064

Chemosensors:

• “Influence of Humidity on NO₂-Sensing and Selectivity of Spray-CVD Grown ZnO Thin Film above 400 °C”
  by Roussin Lontio Fomekong and Bilge Saruhan
  Chemosensors 2019, 7(3), 42; doi: 10.3390/chemosensors7030042
• “Low Molecular Weight Fluorescent Probes (LMFPs) to Detect the Group 12 Metal Triad”
  by Ashley D. Johnson, Rose M. Curtis and Karl J. Wallace
  Chemosensors 2019, 7(2), 22; doi: 10.3390/chemosensors7020022

Journal of Marine Science and Engineering:

• “Marine Application of Fiber Reinforced Composites: A Review”
  by Felice Rubino, Antonio Nisticò, Fausto Tucci and Pierpaolo Carlone
  Mar. Sci. Eng. 2020, 8(1), 26; doi: 10.3390/jmse8010026
• “Numerical Simulation of Large Wave Heights from Super Typhoon Nepartak (2016) in the Eastern Waters of Taiwan”
  by Shih-Chun Hsiao, Hongey Chen, Han-Lun Wu, Wei-Bo Chen, Chih-Hsin Chang, Wen-Dar Guo, Yung-Ming Chen and Lee-Yaw Lin
  Mar. Sci. Eng. 2020, 8(3), 217; doi: 10.3390/jmse8030217
• “Development of Deterministic Artificial Intelligence for Unmanned Underwater Vehicles (UUV)”
  by Timothy Sands
  Mar. Sci. Eng. 2020, 8(8), 578; doi: 10.3390/jmse8080578

Lubricants:

• “Solid Lubrication with MoS₂: A Review”
  by Mohammad R. Vazirisereshk, Ashlie Martini, David A. Strubbe and Mehmet Z. Baykara
  Lubricants 2019, 7(7), 57; doi:10.3390/lubricants7070057
• “Investigations of the Friction Losses of Different Engine Concepts. Part 1: A Combined Approach for Applying Subassembly-Resolved Friction Loss Analysis on a Modern Passenger-Car Diesel Engine”
  by Christoph Knauder, Hannes Allmaier, David E. Sander and Theodor Sams
  Lubricants 2019, 7(5), 39; doi: 10.3390/lubricants7050039
• “A Discussion on Present Theories of Rubber Friction, with Particular Reference to Different Possible Choices of Arbitrary Roughness Cutoff Parameters”
  by Andrea Genovese, Flavio Farroni, Antonio Papangelo and Michele Ciavarella
  Lubricants 2019, 7(10), 85; doi: 10.3390/lubricants7100085

Micromachines:

• “4D Printing of Multi-Hydrogels Using Direct Ink Writing in a Supporting Viscous Liquid”
  by Takuya Uchida and Hiroaki Onoe
  Micromachines 2019, 10(7), 433; doi: 10.3390/mi10070433
• “Enhanced Photocatalytic Performance and Mechanism of Au@CaTiO₃ Composites with Au Nanoparticles Assembled on CaTiO₃ Nanocuboids”
  by Yuxiang Yan, Hua Yang, Zao Yi, Ruishan Li and Xiangxian Wang
  Micromachines 2019, 10(4), 254; doi: 10.3390/mi10040254
• “Three-Dimensionally Structured Flexible Fog Harvesting Surfaces Inspired by Namib Desert Beetles”
  by Jun Kyu Park and Seok Kim
  Micromachines 2019, 10(3), 201; doi: 10.3390/mi10030201

Processes:

• “Accelerating Biologics Manufacturing by Modeling or: Is Approval under the QbD and PAT Approaches Demanded by Authorities Acceptable without a Digital-Twin?”
  by Steffen Zobel-Roos, Axel Schmidt, Fabian Mestmäcker, Mourad Mouellef, Maximilian Huter, Lukas Uhlenbrock, Martin Kornecki, Lara Lohmann, Reinhard Ditz and Jochen Strube
  Processes 2019, 7(2), 94; doi: 10.3390/pr7020094
• “Multiscale Agent-Based and Hybrid Modeling of the Tumor Immune Microenvironment”
  by Kerri-Ann Norton, Chang Gong, Samira Jamalian and Aleksander S. Popel
  Processes 2019, 7(1), 37; doi: 10.3390/pr7010037
• “Dynamic Flowsheet Model Development and Sensitivity Analysis of a Continuous Pharmaceutical Tablet Manufacturing Process Using the Wet Granulation Route”
  by Nirupaplava Metta, Michael Ghijs, Elisabeth Schäfer, Ashish Kumar, Philippe Cappuyns, Ivo Van Assche, Ravendra Singh, Rohit Ramachandran, Thomas De Beer, Marianthi Ierapetritou and Ingmar Nopens
  Processes 2019, 7(4), 234; doi: 10.3390/pr7040234

Sensors:

• “A Decentralized Privacy-Preserving Healthcare Blockchain for IoT”
  by Ashutosh Dhar Dwivedi, Gautam Srivastava, Shalini Dhar and Rajani Singh
  Sensors 2019, 19(2), 326; doi: 10.3390/s19020326
• “The Progress of Glucose Monitoring—A Review of Invasive to Minimally and Non-Invasive Techniques, Devices and Sensors”
  by Wilbert Villena Gonzales, Ahmed Toaha Mobashsher and Amin Abbosh
  Sensors 2019, 19(4), 800; doi: 10.3390/s19040800
• “Contact-Based Methods for Measuring Respiratory Rate”
  by Carlo Massaroni, Andrea Nicolò, Daniela Lo Presti, Massimo Sacchetti, Sergio Silvestri and Emiliano Schena
  Sensors 2019, 19(4), 908; doi: 10.3390/s19040908

World Electric Vehicle Journal:

• “Dynamic Wireless Power Transfer Charging Infrastructure for Future EVs: From Experimental Track to Real Circulated Roads Demonstrations”
  by Stéphane Laporte, Gérard Coquery, Virginie Deniau, Alexandre De Bernardinis and Nicolas Hautière
  World Electr. Veh. J. 2019, 10(4), 84; doi: 10.3390/wevj10040084

MDPI’s Young Investigator Awards recognize promising junior researchers, acknowledge their contributions, and enhance communication among scientists. We are proud to present the winners for the year 2021 in the “Engineering” category. The winners were selected by the journals’ editors.

We warmly congratulate the awarded Young Investigators for their outstanding contributions. MDPI will continue to provide support and recognition to the academic community.

Biosensors:

• Amay J. Bandodkar, North Carolina State University, USA.

ChemEngineering:

• Andrew S. Paluch, Miami University, USA.

Chemosensors:

• Mindy Levine, Ariel University, Israel.

Electronics:

• Amir H. Gandomi, University of Technology Sydney, Australia.

Journal of Marine Science and Engineering:

• Tiago Fazeres-Ferradosa, University of Porto, Portugal.

Machines:

• Chen Lv, Nanyang Technological University (NTU), Singapore;
• Ignacio Gonzalez-Prieto, University of Malaga (UMA), Spain;
• Ning Sun, Nankai University, China.

Processes:

• Anton Rassõlkin, Tallinn University of Technology, Estonia.

Sensors:

• Qammer H. Abbasi, Queen Mary University of London, UK;
• Chi Hwan Lee, Purdue University, USA.

We are proud to recognize the winners of MDPI’s 2021 Travel Awards in the “Engineering” category for their outstanding presentations and to present them with the prize.

MDPI journals regularly offer travel awards to encourage talented junior scientists to present their latest research at academic conferences in specific fields, which helps to increase their influence.

The winners mentioned below were carefully selected by the journal editors based on an outline of their research and the work to be presented at an academic conference.

We would like to warmly congratulate the winners of this year’s Travel Awards and wish them the greatest success with their future research endeavors. MDPI will continue to enhance communication among scientists.

Actuators:

• Matthew Wei Ming Tan, Nanyang Technological University, Singapore.

Applied Sciences:

• Márcia de Sousa Oliveira, University of León, Spain;
• Caroline Sarah Taylor, University of Sheffield, UK;
• Raquel Viveiros, NOVA University of Lisbon, Portugal;
• Alfonso González Briones, University of Salamanca, Spain;
• Alen Horvat, University Carlos III Madrid, Spain;
• Marie Švecová, University of Chemistry and Technology, Czech Republic;
• Venanzio Giannella, University of Salerno, Italy;
• Michaël Lobet, University of Namur, Belgium;
• Lam Thi Ngoc Tran, National Research Council, Italy;
• Hanfei Mei, University of South Carolina, USA.

Applied System Innovation:

• Mert Nakip, Polish Academy of Sciences, Poland.

Biosensors:

• Mengdi Bao, Rochester Institute of Technology, USA;

Yichi Su, Stanford University, USA.

Buildings:

• Karthik Panchabikesan, Concordia University, Canada;
• Xiaolei Yuan, Tongji University, China.

Chemosensors:

• Verónica Montes García, Université de Strasbourg & CNRS, France.

Electronics:

• Peng Hang, Nanyang Technological University, Singapore;
• Alfonso González Briones, University of Salamanca, Spain.

Fluids:

• Alberto Zingaro, Politecnico di Milano, Italy;
• Sarah E. Morris, Auburn University, USA.

Infrastructures:

• Angelo Aloisio, University of L’Aquila, Italy;
• André Filipe Castanheira Alves Furtado, University of Porto, Portugal.

Journal of Low Power Electronics and Applications:

• Tommaso Zanotti, University of Modena and Reggio Emilia, Italy.

Journal of Manufacturing and Materials Processing:

• Nagalingam Arun Prasanth, Rolls-Royce@NTU Corporate Lab, Singapore.

Machines:

• Muhammad Jamil, Nanjing University of Aeronautics and Astronautics (NUAA), China;
• Mariagrazia Tristano, Sheffield Hallam University, UK.

Processes:

• Michele Schlich, University of Cagliari, Italy;
• Álvaro Santana Mayor, University of La Laguna, Spain.

Sensors:

• Eleonora Macchia, Åbo Akademi University, Finland;
• Alfonso Gonzalez Briones, University of Salamanca, Spain;
• Saúl Vallejos Calzada, University of Burgos, Spain;
• Ana Novo, University of Vigo, Spain;
• Yalin Liu, Macau University of Science and Technology, China;
• Marilena Giglio, Politecnico of Bari, Italy;
• Yuzhi Shi, Nanyang Technological University (NTU), Singapore.

In order to acknowledge our reviewers, who so generously dedicate their time to reviewing papers and demonstrate diligence, professionalism, and timeliness when reviewing manuscripts, MDPI journals regularly offer outstanding reviewer awards to scholars who participate in the peer-review process.

We are proud to recognize the winners for the year 2021 in the “Engineering” category for their outstanding contributions among extensive competition by presenting them with an Outstanding Reviewer Award.

We would like to take this opportunity to congratulate all of the winners on their achievement. MDPI will continue to provide support and recognition to the academic community.

Actuators:

• Ryszard Dindorf, Kielce University of Technology, Poland.

Applied Sciences:

• Khaled Giasin, University of Portsmouth, UK;
• Jakub Krzysztof Grabski, University of Technology, Poland;
• Marcos Tostado-Véliz, University of Jaén, Spain;
• Luigi Pugliese, University of Calabria, Italy;
• Francesco Bennardo, University of Catanzaro, Italy;
• Heriberto Perez-Acebo, University of the Basque Country UPV/EHU, Spain.

Biosensors:

• Amir Hatamie, University of Gothenburg, Sweden.

Buildings:

• Francesco Fiorito, Polytechnic University of Bari, Italy;
• Paul G. O’Brien, York University, Canada.

Chemosensors:

• Verónica Montes García, University of Strasbourg, France.

Machines:

• Piotr Gierlak, Rzeszow University of Technology, Poland;
• Sebastian A. Nugroho, University of Michigan, USA;
• Viorel Paleu, Gheorghe Asachi Technical University of Iasi, Romania.

Processes:

• Marcin Dębowski, University of Warmia and Mazury in Olsztyn, Poland;
• Bartłomiej Zieniuk, Warsaw University of Life Sciences, Poland;
• Zbigniew Nadolny, Poznan University of Technology, Poland;
• Attila Egedy, University of Pannonia, Hungary;
• Seok-Ho Rhi, Chungbuk National University, Korea.

Sensors:

• Hojong Choi, Kumoh National Institute of Technology, Korea;
• Li Fu, Hangzhou Dianzi University, China;
• Leonardo De Mello Honorio, Federal University of Juiz De Fora Juiz De Fora, Brazil;
• Mario Versaci, Mediterranea University, Italy;
• Robertas Damasevicius, Kaunas University of Technology, Lithuania.

The 2021 citation metrics have been officially released in Scopus!

We are pleased to announce that 182 MDPI journals are included, of which:

● 21 journals received their first CiteScore.
● 85% of journals increased their CiteScore from 2020.
● 155 journals (85%) ranked above average, in at least one category.

The following 65 MDPI journals (36%) ranked among the top 25% of journals, in at least one category:

Source: 2021 CiteScores™ (Elsevier)

Prof. Dr. Andrea D'Ambrogio is an Associate Professor of software and systems engineering at the Department of Enterprise Engineering of the University of Roma “Tor Vergata” (Italy).

He has formerly been an Assistant Professor of computer science at the Faculty of Engineering of the University of Roma "Tor Vergata", a Research Associate at the Concurrent Engineering Research Center of West Virginia University (USA), a Member of the software engineering research staff at the Department of Computer Science, Systems and Production of the University of Roma "Tor Vergata", and a System Manager of the department's Software Laboratory. He is the Director of the postgraduate master’s degree program in "Systems Engineering", established at the University of Roma "Tor Vergata" in 2012.

Prof. Dr. Andrea D'Ambrogio's research interests are in the software and systems engineering field, specifically in the areas of systems and software performance as well as dependability engineering, model-driven systems and software engineering, business process management, and distributed simulation. In such areas he has participated in several projects at both European and overseas levels, and has authored more than 150 journal/conference papers.

He has been the General Chair of the 2019 Spring Simulation Conference (SpringSim'19), the 2018 Summer Simulation Multi-Conference (SummerSim'18), the 49th Summer Computer Simulation Conference (SCSC 2017), the SCS/ACM/IEEE International Symposium on Theory of Modeling & Simulation (TMS 2014), and the IEEE International Conference on Enabling Technologies: Infrastructure for Collaborative Enterprises (WETICE 2008). He has served as a Program Chair and/or Member of the Steering and Program Committee of various international conferences, including IEEE WETICE, SCS/ACM SpringSim, SCS/ACM SummerSim, IEEE/ACM PADS, IEEE/ACM DS-RT, and the INFORMS/ACM Winter Simulation Conference. He started the IEEE International Workshop on Collaborative Modeling and Simulation (CoMetS) in 2010 and the SCS/ACM International Symposium on Model-driven Approaches for Simulation Engineering (Mod4Sim) in 2011.

Prof. Dr. Andrea D'Ambrogio is an Associate Editor of the Transactions of the Society for Modeling & Simulation International (SIMULATION), a Member of the Editorial Board of the IAENG International Journal of Computer Science (IJCS) and MDPI’s Modelling, and has been a Member of the Editorial Board of the Simulation Practice and Theory (SIMPAT). He has been a Member of the Scientific Board of the ICT COST Action on “Multi Paradigm Modelling for Cyber Physical Systems” (MPM4CPS). He is the President-Elect and a Member of the Board of Directors of the Society for Modeling & Simulation International (SCS), and is a Member of IEEE, IEEE Computer Society, ACM, and INCOSE. He is also the Director of Academic Affairs of the Italian Association of Systems Engineering—INCOSE Italy Chapter (AISE).

We warmly welcome Prof. Dr. Andrea D’Ambrogio to the Editorial Board of Software (ISSN: 2674-113X), and we look forward to his contributions to the continued success of the journal.

We are pleased to announce that the journal Software (ISSN 2674-113X) has just released its inaugural issue.

Software (ISSN 2674-113X) is an international, peer-reviewed, open access journal on all aspects of software engineering published online quarterly by MDPI. The main subject areas include software requirements, design, architecture, development, testing, verification, security, privacy, programming languages, code assessment, software tools, software business, software platforms, etc.

You can read our aims and scope to learn more about Software. To see the full list of Editorial Board Members, please click here.

Highly Accessed Papers

• “A Framework for Rapid Robotic Application Development for Citizen Developers”
  Konstantinos Panayiotou, Emmanouil Tsardoulias, Christoforos Zolotas, Andreas L. Symeonidis and Loukas Petrou
  Software 2022, 1(1), 53-79; doi:10.3390/software1010004

• “The MESSIR Flexible Scientific Approach to Requirements Engineering”
  Nicolas Guelfi
  Software 2022, 1(1), 80-106; doi:10.3390/software1010005

• “Athlos: A Framework for Developing Scalable MMOG Backends on Commodity Clouds”
  Nicos Kasenides and Nearchos Paspallis
  Software 2022, 1(1), 107-145; doi:0.3390/software1010006

To access all the latest papers published in Software please see here.

Why Submit to Software?

• Open Access—Free to download, share, and reuse content;
• Rapid Publication—First decisions in 15 days and acceptance for publication in 3 days, median values for papers published in this journal in the first half of 2021;
• Recognition of Reviewers—APC discount vouchers, optional signed peer review, and reviewer names published annually in the journal;
• No Space Constraints, No Extra Space or Color Charges—No restriction on the length of the papers, number of figures, or colors.

Software Editorial Office

We are pleased to announce that Prof. Dr. Tiziana Margaria has joined Software (ISSN: 2674-113X) as an Editorial Board Member.

Prof. Dr. Tiziana Margaria is the Chair of Software Systems at the Department of Computer Science and Information Systems, University of Limerick. She is the Course Director and program co-director of the brand-new Immersive Software Engineering integrated B.Sc./M.Sc. program at UL. She leads research and education in advanced software systems and explainable AI. Her work spans from formal method-based approaches for high-assurance software in Lero, to the end-to-end interoperability of heterogeneous computing systems in advanced manufacturing in Confirm, and software solutions for rigorous and explainable AI and ML in the Centre of Research Training in AI. She co-leads and applies integrated healthcare in the UL Cancer Network and the Limerick Digital Cancer Research Centre. She is a Fellow and currently the Vice President of the Irish Computer Society, Vice President of the IFIP Working Group on Design and Engineering of Electronic Systems, and past President of the European Association for Software Science and Technology.

We are pleased to announce that Prof. Dr. Anna Rita Fasolino has joined Software (ISSN: 2674-113X) as an Editorial Board Member.

Prof. Dr. Anna Rita Fasolino is an Associate Professor at the Department of Electrical Engineering and Information Technology at the University of Napoli Federico II, Italy.

Her research interests are focused on software engineering with an emphasis on software testing, GUI and mobile app testing, reverse engineering, web engineering, and embedded software engineering. She has developed and participated in numerous R&D projects and co-authored more than 100 articles published in IEEE/ACM international journals, books, proceedings of conferences, and workshops.

In recent years, Prof. Dr. Fasolino has served as a member of the program committee and collaborated in the  organization of many international conferences, including IEEE ICST—International Conference on Software Testing, Verification, and Reliability, IEEE ICSE—International Conference on Software Engineering, IEEE INTUITEST, and IEEE INTUITESTBEDS. She is an Editorial Board Member of several scientific journals in this field, including the Journal of Systems and Software, Array, PeerJ Computer Science, and MDPI Computers.

Prof. Dr. Fasolino’s research and publications have received many citations in the research community, including at least 4900 Google Scholar citations and 2500 citations on Scopus. She has been granted distinguished awards at IEEE CSM 2002 and ICSM 2012 conferences for her work on web testing and automated mobile app GUI testing.

We are pleased to announce that Prof. Dr. Welf Löwe has joined Software (ISSN 2674-113X) as an Editorial Board Member. 

Prof. Dr. Welf Löwe (http://welf.se/) is the head of research in Computer Science at Linnaeus University (Lnu, https://lnu.se/), Sweden. 

He studied computer science at TU Dresden, Germany, and received a Ph.D. degree in computer science from TH Karlsruhe, Germany, before he became a full professor at Lnu in 2002.

His research addresses software analysis and building technologies including Big Data and AI, quality assessment of software and technical documentation, design pattern detection and architecture recovery for software comprehension, context-aware composition and parallelization for software optimization, and garbage collection and pointer analysis as foundations. 

He is the founder and director of the Linnaeus university center for “Data Intensive Sciences and Applications” (DISA, https://lnu.se/en/disa), a research excellence center at Lnu. It focuses on research related to multidisciplinary Big Data and AI in engineering, sciences, and the humanities. He also directs an affiliated industry graduate school (DIA, https://lnu.se/en/dia) for applied research in these fields. 

He is a member and currently the secretary of the IFIP working group 2.4 "Software Implementation Technology".  

He is a co-founder of several companies that commercialize relevant research results including Softwerk (https://softwerk.se/) building advanced software systems and compilers, DueDive (https://duedive.com/) analyzing IT companies and their software, and Aimo (https://aimo-fit.com/) applying computer-vision-based movement analyses.