Dear Colleagues,

In 2022, we will publish a Special Issue on the topic of "Recent Advances in Mineral Processing and Coal Preparation for Sustainable Development" in Sustainability (SCI index). The purpose of the Special Issue is to provide an up-to-date discussion and new outlook on the broad field of green coal mining, low carbon utilization, sustainable development of coal industry, water resource protection, and utilization in coal mining and engineering applications. The topic of this Special Issue not only includes the latest progress of mineral processing and coal preparation for sustainable development but also provides new mechanic theory in rock engineering, including AI-based rock mechanics, non-continually mining-induced mechanics, cluster mechanics, and critical mechanics used in safe mining coal and coal carbon-correlated new materials.

Recent advancements in theory, lab or in-situ test, numerical modeling, and perspective view of sustainable development in coal mining are also encouraged for discussion. The key technologies improving the efficiency or enhancing the sustainability of coal usage, considering low-carbon emission or carbon collection are also welcome to supplement the existing literature or patents. In the future, the green and low-carbon-based usage of coal and its safe mining at deep depths still present huge challenges. In particular, in 2022, the continually rising price and consummation of coal resources has attracted the attention of this issue to an increasing number of people in Europe and Asia, furthermore, extending to rest of the world. The launch of this Special Issue of "Recent Advances in Mineral Processing and Coal Preparation for Sustainable Development" could encourage everyday people to learn more about the coal industry.

All topics in the coal science of mechanics and sustainability of coal usage are relevant, and these include but are not limited to:

1. Coal prices continuing to rise.
2. New theory or technology in green coal mining;
3. Low carbon utilization to improve the sustainable development of coal industry;
4. Advancements of experimental test or engineering concept in water resource protection and utilization;
5. New mechanical theory of solving discontinuous distribution of stress;
6. Abutment pressure-based view of coal bump or static-to-dynamic behavior;
7. Applications or development of in-situ stress measurement;
8. Influence of THM coupling on the redistribution of abutment pressure;
9. New findings of some dynamic behavior by modeling abutment pressure distribution;
10. Development of reinforcement for large deformation by building new mechanical model;
11. Numerical solution of stress redistribution using PD model, phase-field model, or others;
12. Big data-based or AI-based investigation of abutment pressure re-distribution.

Dr. Dongjie Xue
Prof. Dr. Xiaofeng Yang
Dr. Zhiguo Cao
Dr. Fuqiang Gao
Dr. Yongliang Wang
Guest Editors

Manuscript Submission Information

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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. Sustainability 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 2400 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.

• green coal mining
• low carbon utilization
• sustainable development of coal industry
• water resource protection and utilization