Dear Colleagues,

The demands of the food industry for the elimination of diseases caused by the presence of pathogen microorganisms in food, and the demands of breeding farms for rapid diagnoses has led to the development of detection methods mostly based on molecular biology, nanotechnology, and nanomaterials. DNA biosensors utilizing optical, electrochemical, and acoustic transducers have demonstrated their feasibility for diagnostic purposes in pathogen detection as they are rapid, specific, sensitive, and cheap. The latest advancements in oligonucleotide selection (SELEX and SAM) have opened new frontiers in this field, proposing the utilization of specific aptamers, that allow the direct detection of cells using a label-free method. The application of aptamers has been increasing in recent years.

DNA-based biosensors can recognize various pathogens, bacteria, viruses, and fungi that can affect humans, animals, plants, food, water, and the environment; moreover, the biosensor market continues to expand significantly from the 2 billion dollars it was valued at in 2016 making this sector attractive for technological industries especially for the production of miniaturized biosensors.

This Special Issue will merge new/recent methods that can be useful in pathogen detection for the development of point-of-care (PoC) devices, and for the development of simple protocols.

Authors are invited to contribute original research papers, review articles, and short communications that focus on the development and utilization of novel methods to assure rapid, simple, and cheap detection of pathogens in food, breeding farms, water, environment, and also for clinical applications.

Prof. Dr. Marisa Manzano
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 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. Micromachines 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 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.

• Pathogen Detection
• DNA Sensors
• Nucleic Acids
• Aptamers
• Optical Biosensors
• Electrochemical Biosensors
• Acoustic Biosensors
• Nanomaterials
• Point of Care
• Lab-on-Chip