Introduction / mission

The ISBE Group carries out research and education in the field of information systems used for the engineering and management of the built environment, into which they are embedded.

Highlighted phrase

New ICT methods and techniques in the context of building sciences and urban sciences.

Organisational profile

According to the United Nations, 60% of the world population will live in urban areas in 2030.The main challenges for the built environment are the rapid increase of people living in cities, the depletion of natural resources and climate change. Therefore, smart solutions, based on ICT and data are needed to manage buildings, public spaces and the overall city. Because waste material is not accepted anymore, ICT is needed to trace building components and material over lifetime. Finally, energy consumption by people needs to be controlled, using ICT to influence their behavior. In the ISBE group we make connection between technology, people and built environment where computing science is linked with behavioral science. BIG data from building/city models are combined with data from sensors and questionnaires to draw conclusions on the quality of the built environment. Information systems are developed to enable informed decisions for the engineering and management of the built environment.

Key research and education topics, with a special focus on smart cities, are:

• Urban management
• Building information management
• Energy neutral cities

The ISBE group is internationally recognized for bridging the gap between ICT and Architecture, Engineering, Construction and Operation (AECO) management.

Staff members’ backgrounds range from architecture, engineering and computational science to social sciences. The ISBE group distinguishes itself from other information systems groups by being embedded in a department of the Built Environment. The group’s focus is not so much on the computational aspects of ICT, but on its application and implementation in the built environment.

Members of the Information Systems group are active in international organizations such as CAAD Futures, eCAADe, and CIB W78. The group has organized and hosted CIB-W78 2015, EG-ICE workshops, CAAD Futures 2001, DRN 2005, 2000, and 1995, DEN 1997, eCAADe 1993.

The ISBE research group participates in the DDSS (Design and Decision Support Systems) research program together with the research groups Urban Planning, and Real Estate Management and Development. Several ISBE group members hold positions in the TU/e Smart Cities Program, a cross-departmental collaboration promoting research in living labs on the topic of smart cities. Furthermore, ISBE members participate in various EU or national funded projects.

Recent research projects:

• CRUNCH (EU-H2020, REF. 730254) on the development of food, energy, water proof solutions to strengthen urban resilience (2018-2020, EUR 1.8 M).
• UNALAB (EU-H2020, REF. 730052-2) on the implementation of nature bases solution in cities for mitigation of climate changes (2017-2022, EUR 1.4M)
• ROCK (EU-H2020, REF. 730280-2) on the implementation of technological, social and organizational innovations for transforming cultural heritage areas into Creative and
• Sustainable Districts (2017-2020, EUR 10.5M)
• CLIC (EU-H2020, REF. 776758) on the development of evaluation tools to test, implement, validate and share innovative "circular" models for systemic adaptive reuse of cultural heritage (2017-2020, EUR 4.9M)
• Triangulum (EU-H2020, REF.  646578) on the implementation of smart cities and communities (2015-2020, EUR 6.4M)
• DESENT (EU-SURF, REF. 5637396) on the development, testing and dissemination an integrated decision support system for smart grid (2016-2019 EUR 1.4M).
• iLocate (EU-FP7, REF. 621040) on the development of  outdoor and indoor navigation system (2014-2016, EUR 4.7M)
• DuraArc (EU-FP7, REF. 600908) on the archiving of building information (2013-2016, EUR 3.7M)