Construction 4.0 Era: The Application of Building Information Modelling (BIM) and Digital Construction

A special issue of Buildings (ISSN 2075-5309). This special issue belongs to the section "Construction Management, and Computers & Digitization".

Deadline for manuscript submissions: 31 December 2025 | Viewed by 743

Special Issue Editors


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Guest Editor
School of the Built Environment and Architecture, London South Bank University, London SE1 0AA, UK
Interests: construction management; facility management; project management; smart building; digital technologies; sustainability; prefabrication
Special Issues, Collections and Topics in MDPI journals

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Guest Editor
Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering, Carnegie Mellon University, Pittsburgh, PA 15213, USA
Interests: construction management; resilient and sustainable infrastructure; AI; secured information systems

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Guest Editor
1. Department of the Built Environment, Birmingham City University, Birmingham B4 7XG, UK
2. CIDB Centre of Excellence, University of Johannesburg, Johannesburg 2092, South Africa
Interests: construction management; plant and machinery management; digital technologies; health and safety; pedagogical research in higher education; business management
Special Issues, Collections and Topics in MDPI journals

Special Issue Information

Dear Colleagues,

The Construction 4.0 era represents a significant shift in the construction industry, leveraging digital technologies to improve efficiency, productivity, and sustainability. Building Information Modelling (BIM) and Digital Construction (DC) are key components of this transformation. Through this Special Issue (SI), we aim to identify the optimal uses of BIM and DC in different building project processes and phases, determine their benefits to building projects and the various stakeholders involved, and provide innovative solutions that address challenges in the Construction 4.0 era.

We invite high-quality and cutting-edge articles for the SI. Topics include, but are not limited to, the following:

  • Construction 4.0 Key Features
    • Digitalization: integration of digital technologies, such as BIM, IoT, and Artificial Intelligence (AI).
    • Industrialization: prefabrication, modular construction, and standardized processes.
    • Information-centric: data-driven decision-making and real-time collaboration.
    • Connectivity: integration of stakeholders, systems, and processes.
  • BIM
    • Digital twins: real-time virtual representation of physical assets/infrastructure.
    • Data-rich models: incorporating construction, operation, and maintenance data.
    • Collaboration: real-time sharing and coordination among stakeholders.
    • Simulation: analyzing construction sequences, energy efficiency, and structural integrity.
  • DC
    • Reality capture: laser scanning, photogrammetry, and drone surveys.
    • AI for predictive analytics, quality control, and defect detection.
    • Sensor integration for monitoring and maintenance.

Dr. Frank Ghansah
Dr. Jinfeng Lou
Dr. Amos Darko
Prof. Dr. David J. Edwards
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. 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.

Keywords

  • construction 4.0 era
  • building information modelling
  • digital construction
  • digital technologies
  • smart construction
  • smart buildings

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Published Papers (1 paper)

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Research

23 pages, 2563 KiB  
Article
Leveraging Social Media Data to Understand COVID-19 Prevention Measures in Construction: A Machine Learning Approach
by Emmanuel B. Boateng, Daniel Oteng, Dan N. O. Bonsu and Vinod Gopaldasani
Buildings 2025, 15(13), 2191; https://doi.org/10.3390/buildings15132191 - 23 Jun 2025
Viewed by 203
Abstract
The COVID-19 pandemic was a particularly challenging time for the construction industry as it experienced significant disruptions to operations, affecting various stakeholders. With various national and international health agencies promoting preventive measures, the construction industry struggled with the implementation of these measures due [...] Read more.
The COVID-19 pandemic was a particularly challenging time for the construction industry as it experienced significant disruptions to operations, affecting various stakeholders. With various national and international health agencies promoting preventive measures, the construction industry struggled with the implementation of these measures due to the unique nature of the work involved in construction. This study aimed to highlight the ways in which stakeholders in the construction industry interacted and responded to the prescribed preventive measures through social media analysis. Using model-based clustering and structural topic modelling, this study provided insights into the prevalent discussion topics in social media around prevention measures in construction. In addition, sentiment analysis demonstrated interesting polarisation around the topic areas. Four prevalent topics that encapsulated the entirety of the social media data were identified, with two of the topics showing an upward trend, as expected, while the other two topics showed a contrasting downward trend. These findings offer practical value for construction managers and policymakers by revealing the effectiveness of different communication strategies and identifying areas where prevention measures faced resistance or acceptance. The sentiment polarisation patterns (50% positive, 40% negative) provide actionable insights for developing more targeted engagement approaches, while the topic evolution trends inform the timing and focus of safety communications. Construction organisations can leverage these insights to improve workplace safety protocols and enhance stakeholder buy-in for future health initiatives. This study lays the foundation for future studies to investigate the connections between the prevalent prevention and the interrelated dynamics within the conversation regarding COVID-19 prevention strategies in the construction sector. Full article
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