New Horizons in Materials Engineering: The Application of Mesoporous Silica-based Materials

Dear Colleagues,

As you know, mesoporous silica discloses a broad variety of possible applications beyond the usual employment of porous materials. It can be used, thanks to its large pore volume, surface area, and surface reactivity, as a starting framework in the design and preparation of nanostructured devices for many different purposes. This is mainly due to its rigid inorganic framework, with regular-sized pores and different surfaces that can be selectively functionalized with different molecules. This Special Issue will focus on the potential applications of mesoporous silica in which the structure of the employed material, which is most likely a hybrid material, is engineered at the nanometric scale. For this reason, the material itself can be considered a device. Among these applications, we can cite the development of drug delivery or targeting systems because most of the biological molecules and pharmaceuticals are a few nanometers long, and the pores of mesoporous silica range typically between 2 and 30 nanometers in diameter, making this inorganic substrate of great relevance for life science applications. Additionally, applications in the diagnostic field can be revolutionary in the same way, because mesoporous silica nanoparticles (MSN) can be selectively functionalized on the external surface also using a fluorescent tracer. We wish to complete this Special Issue with original research papers dealing with applications of mesoporous materials as catalysts, adsorbents, or stationary phases in chromatography, and, last but not least, with the design of a new energy storage system that will be potentially useful for renewable energy development.

Prof. Luigi Pasqua
Guest Editor

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