Research Project

Human behavior in the built environment and socio-economic system is considerably vulnerable to the influences of individual heterogeneity and complex interactions. Despite its significance, human behavior has heretofore been assumed to be impervious to various factors and conditions, without understanding it from diverse perspectives. Addressing this challenge towards developing human-centered smart and sustainable building management system at the room, building, and community level, this research project allows to investigate human-building-community interaction and provide some solutions to various issues faced in different scales of the built environment. Towards this end, this research project proposes three specific aims and objectives according to different scales of the built environment: 

(1) Aim 1 (Room Level): Immersive Virtual Reality (IVR)-based pre-occupancy evaluation; 

(2) Aim 2 (Building Level): Internet of Things (IoT)-based real-time automatic controlling; and 

(3) Aim 3 (Community Level): Simulation-based energy resilience planning. First, IVR experiments will be performed to investigate various occupant responses to various built environments with different design variables. Second, IoT energy and environment sensors will be applied to investigate relationships among occupant responses, building energy consumption, and indoor environment quality. Third, agent-based modeling (ABM) will be performed to investigate the diffusion of various energy saving behaviors or technologies. Ultimately, the proposed system will improve human health, comfort, and satisfaction while maximizing building performance and community engagement.