Imperatives of interdisciplinary materials research in the health, energy, and environment - A salient feature of Special Issue, Advanced Materials Letters, October 2020

Efficient technology, its assessment and exploration based on materials configuration is the imperative area of research and developments for the energy sustainability, health, and environment. The International Association of Advanced Materials is happy to release its official diamond open access journal, Advanced Materials Letters, 10^th issue, October 2020, which emphasis the “Efficient Materials Research and Technologies” in sustainable way to drift advance materials towards high order values with green practices.

Now, healthcare, energy and environment are the peculiarities of materials research and innovation. International Association of Advanced Materials (IAAM) gives platform to such initiative free of cost and publishes research articles in its official monthly journal, Advanced Materials Letters, which has focused here on the theme “Advancement of Materials to Global Excellence”. IAAM promote sustainable world with special focus on Health, Energy, and Environment and taking challenges ahead with expert members of worldwide materials community.

The importance of this issue is disseminating the IAAM’s goals on Advancement of Materials to Global Excellence with special focus on Health, Energy, and Environment. This special issue is accomplished by the three guest editors, 1) Prof. Jingan Li, School of Materials Science and Engineering & Henan Key Laboratory of Advanced Magnesium Alloy & Key Laboratory of Materials Processing and Mold Technology (Ministry of Education), Zhengzhou University, China; 2) Prof. Mariya Aleksandrova, Department of Microelectronics, Technical University of Sofia, Bulgaria; and 3) Dr. Yun Qian, Department of Orthopedics, Shanghai Jiao Tong University Affiliated Sixth People’s Hospital, China.

The special issue contains ten descriptive articles in advanced healthcare biomaterials such as regeneration, reconstruction of damaged tissues and organs. The specific microenvironment imbalance in peripheral nerve repair and role of marine oriented materials in the repairing with use of biomaterial scaffolds are described. The review on biodegradable magnesium alloy vascular stent has useful healthcare implications.

In this issue, energy harvesting applications is discussed in connection with sputtered barium strontium titanate films. Under global energy requirement renewable energy and piezoelectric sources are included in detail. Piezoelectric Sensors with interface circuit has important research implication. Further, nanostructuring of piezoelectric materials in relation to aluminum oxide is important to understand.

Another important article has discussed the properties of diamond-like carbon coatings for artificial joints. Most importantly, fabrication of polystyrene microspheres is discussed for utilization in chiral drug isolation. All these health and energy related articles increasing better understanding about advancement of the materials and contribute to energy efficient technology for sustainable and healthy environment.

All the articles published in the issue cover relevant information of health and energy research, which is migrating towards sustainable system to make AML resourceful for advanced materials science, engineering, and technology. IAAM established its networking to propagate green environment through promoting research, technology, innovation in health, energy and environment field via its not-for-profit, Diamond Open Access (DOA) advanced materials journals under flagship of ‘Advancement of materials to sustainable and green world’.

About Cover

To mark the 10th anniversary, International Association of Advanced Materials, IAAM initiated to publish special issues on the theme “Advancement of Materials to Global Excellence”. The primary aim behind this special issue is to provide a collection of informative articles on a special set of advanced materials on the interdisciplinary advanced materials research with a special focus in Health, Energy, and Environment.

The October 2020 special issue has combined the theme Advanced Healthcare Biomaterials, Tissue Engineering and Peripheral Nerve Regeneration, and Recent Advances in Flexible Piezoelectric Energy Harvesters. The cover photo of the issue is dedicated to the efforts of IAAM towards the promotion of sustainability in the area of Health, Energy, and Environment.

OPEN ACCESS Perspective Article: Advanced Healthcare Biomaterials

The first article of the issue is authored by Prof. Jingan Li from Zhengzhou University, PR China.describes the biomedical fields and advanced healthcare.Here, author discussed aboutthe regeneration and reconstruction of damaged tissues & organs, minimally invasive treatment, and early detection and diagnosis, etc. The article emphasizes that traditional medical materials adhere metal, macromolecule; bioceramics etc. cannot meet the needs of rapid development of medicine.

Citation of the article: Adv. Mater. Lett., 2020, 11(10), 20101560. [Download Full Text in PDF]

OPEN ACCESS Perspective Article: Piezoelectric Alternative Energy Sources as a Part of the Global Energy Concerns – Future Prospects in the Science and Market

The second article of the issue is authored by Prof. Mariya Aleksandrova from Technical University of Sofia, Bulgaria. This article has overviewed the global situation, efforts, and prospects of the development of piezoelectric materials and harvesting devices in terms of research interest, industrial implementation, sectors of application and market forecasts. Here, the authorhas explained about the portable and smart electronic devices, which are powered by batteries whose life is limited. In recent years the idea of renewable energy and methods of its obtaining by environmentally friendly technologies gained popularity. The energy harvesting from the surrounding environment have the capabilities to solve the problem of battery-less power supply. This energy conversion endorsing the concepts of "clean" energy.

Citation of the article: Adv. Mater. Lett., 2020, 11(10), 20101561. [Download Full Text in PDF]

OPEN ACCESS Perspective Article: Rectify the Injury-Induced Microenvironment Imbalance in Peripheral Nerve Repair

The third article of this issue is written by Zhiwen Yan and Yun Qian from Shanghai Jiao Tong University Affiliated Sixth People’s Hospital, China. Here, the authors’ research is focused on the peripheral nerve injury. This injury poses a great threat to the involved individuals’ life quality. In this perspective, author analyses four different ways to stabilize the disturbed microenvironment:

• nourish the distal nerve end,
• stabilize the immune response,
• rectify the energy metabolic disturbance,
• restore the bioelectrical signal conduction.

Citation of the article: Adv. Mater. Lett., 2020, 11(10), 20101562. [Download Full Text in PDF]

OPEN ACCESS Review Article: A Mini Review on Biodegradable Magnesium Alloy Vascular Stent

The fourth article of the issue talks about the research of degradable Mg alloy stents in terms of degradation mechanism, structural design and basic research experiments. Mg alloys are excellent materials for vascular stents benefit from their sufficient mechanical properties and good biocompatibility and biodegradable property. This article is reported by Changsheng Liu, Yachen Hou andJingan Li from Zhengzhou University, PR China.Here, the authors’ discussedabout the biodegradable magnesium alloy stents, which are the new generation of vascular stents which can open up blocked blood vessels at an early stage, then degrade and be absorbed by the body at a suitable rate after the vascular has been repaired.

Citation of the article: Adv. Mater. Lett., 2020, 11(10), 20101563. [Download Full Text in PDF]

OPEN ACCESS Review Article: Prospective Applications of Marine Oriented Materials in the Repair of Peripheral Nerve Injury

The fifth article discusses how peripheral nerve injury is a thorny problem for many years because it is difficult to find out appropriate drugs or materials that can maximize healing effects and minimize damages to human body.This article is reported by Yunxiao Gu etal., from Shanghai Jiao Tong University Affiliated Sixth People’s Hospital, and Shanghai Sixth People’s Hospital East Affiliated to Shanghai University of Medicine & Health Sciences, China. Among various methods, the use of biomaterial scaffolds on injured nerves has been favored due to the biocompatibility, accessibility, and effectiveness. Marine oriented materials have attracted huge attention with their unique pro-regenerative potential.

Citation of the article: Adv. Mater. Lett., 2020, 11(10), 20101564. [Download Full Text in PDF]

OPEN ACCESS Research Article: Design and Implementation of Dynamic FPAA based Interface Circuit for Thin Film Lead-Free Piezoelectric Sensors

The sixth article emphasize about the interface electronic circuit for thin film piezoelectric sensing structures. Here an interface electronic prototype based on dynamically programmed Field Programmable Analog Array (FPAA) is configured to implement Root-Mean-Square (RMS) to DC (RMS-to-DC) conversion process, based on direct method. This article is reported by Ivailo M. Pandiev and Mariya P. Aleksandrova from Technical University of Sofia, Bulgaria. Here authors studied piezoelectric sensors and described that devices show sensitivity to low frequency, weak mechanical loads and exhibit excellent stability at multiple vibration cycles.

Citation of the article: Adv. Mater. Lett., 2020, 11(10), 20101565. [Download Full Text in PDF]

OPEN ACCESS Research Article: An approach for Nanostructuring of Piezoelectric Materials by Template-Assisted Growth in Porous Aluminum Oxide

The seventh article of the issue presents the details about the geometrical structuring of the piezoelectric material which leads to higher piezoelectric voltage per unit volume. This article was authored by Tsvetozar Tsanev, Mariya Aleksandrova, Boriana Tzaneva, and Valentin Videkov from Technical University of Sofia, Bulgaria.This paper is devoted to the approach for nanostructuring piezoelectric materials to enhance their electrical signal producing ability from a small area of mechanical activation for potential application as energy harvesting. Moreover, the obtained final structure was observed by scanning electron microscopy and Energy Dispersive X-Ray spectroscopy.

Citation of the article: Adv. Mater. Lett., 2020, 11(10), 20101566. [Download Full Text in PDF]

OPEN ACCESS Research Article: Study of Sputtered Barium Strontium Titanate Films for Energy Harvesting Applications

The eighth article of the issue is authored by Mariya Aleksandrova et al., from Technical University of Sofia, Bulgaria. Other authors were belonging from Bulgarian Academy of Sciences, Bulgariaand Bielefeld University, Germany. Here, authors discussed aboutthin films of BaSrTiO₃ (BST), which were deposited by radio frequency (RF) sputtering with sputtering voltage varied between 0.5 and 0.7 kV. BaSrTiO₃ films are investigated regarding their suitability for use in flexible energy harvesting devices.The result proved that the sputtered BaSrTiO₃ films are suitable for thin film piezoelectric nanogenerators and by the sputtering voltage their efficiency tuned. This study suggests that applications of the proposed element are low-frequency vibrational harvesting and a strain gauge.

Citation of the article: Adv. Mater. Lett., 2020, 11(10), 20101567. [Download Full Text in PDF]

OPEN ACCESS Research Article: The Effect of Bias on Properties of DLC Coatings for Artificial Joints

The ninth article of the issue described about the diamond-like carbon (DLC) coatings, which has excellent tribological and biological properties, which were used wildly to improve the wear resistance and corrosion resistance of the metal-based artificial joints. This article is reported by Ren Ying eta al., from Henan University Of Technology, China. In this work, DLC coatings were deposited by a vacuum arc using the anode-cathode diameter ratio of da/dc=3/1 with the negative bias applied to the P2000 steel substrate. Here, the relation between the substrate bias and properties of DLC coatings was investigated.

Citation of the article: Adv. Mater. Lett., 2020, 11(10), 20101568. [Download Full Text in PDF]

OPEN ACCESS Research Article: Fabrication of Tens-Micron-Sized Functionalized Polystyrene Microspheres for Utilization in Chiral Drug Isolation

The tenth article of the issue described about the functionalized polystyrene (PS) microspheres, which are promising materials for the isolation of the chiral drugs due to their properties, such as a large surface area, high chemical stability and tunable morphology. This article is reported by Wang Renjie et al., from Henan University of Technology, China. Here, authors reported a facile synthesis of the tens-micron-sized carboxylated PS microspheres by a technology between the dispersion and suspension polymerization. The relation between the reaction solutions and the size of the carboxylated PS microspheres were investigated.

Citation of the article: Adv. Mater. Lett., 2020, 11(10), 20101569. [Download Full Text in PDF]

Entire scholarly article that readers attempt to open access are available online for reading at https://www.vbripress.com/aml/. International Association of Advanced Materials, IAAM is engaged in the promotion of not-for-profit Diamond Open Access Publishing. Here are the latest calls for all the members of the advanced materials community to submit their articlesor proposalfor special issue in the Advanced Materials Letters. The peer-review process of submitted articles in the Advanced Materials Letters is done by manuscript central, ScholarOne – Web of Science Group – Clarivate Analytics, USA. The researchers are invited to submit their next manuscripts to this journal at ScholarOne manuscript submission system.