Enhancing Built Environment Performance Through Human-Centered Design and Intelligent Optimization

Dear Colleagues,

The built environment is undergoing profound transformations driven by digital technologies, intelligent systems, and an increasing focus on human experience. Human-centered design has emerged as a critical perspective for understanding how people perceive, interact with, and respond to architectural and urban spaces. At the same time, advances in artificial intelligence, simulation tools, and data-driven optimization have reshaped the way buildings are conceived, evaluated, and operated. Integrating these two paradigms is essential for improving building per-formance, enhancing user well-being, and achieving sustainable, resilient, and inclusive development.

This Special Issue invites high-quality contributions that explore how human-centered design principles and intelligent optimization strategies can jointly enhance the performance of the built environment. We welcome interdisciplinary studies that incorporate engineering, architecture, environmental psychology, ergonomics, human–computer interaction, data science, and urban studies. Submissions may involve theoretical frameworks, methodological innovations, empirical investigations, simulation-based studies, or application cases that highlight the role of human perception, cognition, behavior, comfort, safety, and well-being in design and performance evaluation. 

Research that leverages emerging technologies such as digital twins, building information modeling, virtual reality, machine learning, evolutionary optimization, neuroergonomic sensing, and human–robot interaction is particularly encouraged. Studies addressing safety, accessibility, inclusiveness, and user-centered decision-making in complex or uncertain environments are also welcome.

Potential topics include the following:

• Human perception and cognitive responses in architectural and urban spaces;
• Digital and intelligent methods for performance-driven design;
• Data-driven modeling of comfort, safety, well-being, and behavior;
• Human-centered optimization of energy use, carbon emissions, and environmental quality;
• Neuroergonomic and physiological sensing for built environment evaluation;
• Human–robot–environment interaction;
• Safety, health, and risk mitigation strategies informed by human factors;
• Design for inclusiveness and universal accessibility;
• Resilience-oriented human-centered design for extreme or uncertain conditions.

This Special Issue seeks to promote cross-disciplinary dialogue and foster innovation in human-centered design and intelligent optimization. We welcome original research articles, review papers, conceptual analyses, methodological developments, and case-based studies that offer new insights or frameworks for advancing the performance, sustainability, and human orientation of buildings and urban environments.

Dr. Dan Chong
Dr. Cynthia Hou
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 250 words) can be sent to the Editorial Office for assessment.

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. Buildings 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 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.

• built environment
• data-driven modeling
• architectural and urban
• human-centered design
• digital twins
• building information modeling
• virtual reality
• machine learning