Polymeric Nanocomposites as Nanomedicine Tools against Infectious Disease Outbreaks

Dear Colleagues,

This Special Issue concentrates on the current progress on “Polymeric Nanocomposites” for nanomedical applications in their use as tools for treatment and/or diagnosis of infectious disease (such as COVID-19) outbreaks. Polymer composite nanomaterials are a challenging area of research. Loading polymers with clay/hybrid particles essentially enhances the composite strength features and offers novel opportunities to load, release or target specifically drugs, active materials and/or biomolecules for sensing and/or drug delivery against the most common infectious diseases, such as influenza or recently developed coronaviruses. 

Of special interest are different nanoassembly methods such as polyelectrolyte layer-by-layer assembly, silane mono-/multilayers, and many others. Among them, polymer clay nanoparticles can be prepared as sheets in a-few-hundred-nm wide and about 1-nm thicknesses (such as montmorillonite and kaolinite). Fibrous clays have significantly strengthened the nanocomposites in the assembly with biopolymers and green polymers, leading to functional hybrid bio nanocomposites.

Papers will be selected summarizing different areas (reviews) or reporting the latest research in the field (original articles). Experimental as well as computational works shall be considered. The scope of the Special Issue includes the comprehensive synthesis and characterization of polymeric nanocomposites used for outbreaks applications, including hybrid nanoassemblies and nanoclay polymer composites.

Prof. Dr. Stefano Leporatti
Prof. Dr. Giuseppe Lazzara
Prof. Dr. Rawil F. Fakhrullin
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. Polymers 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.

• nanocomposites
• nanomedicine
• polymeric nanoparticles
• nanoclays
• drug delivery
• infectious diseases
• outbreaks
• viruses
• COVID-19