Buildings (Journal)

Description

Special Issue
Sustainable Urban–Rural Transitions: Integrating Smart Technologies and Inclusive Development from a Socio-Technical Perspective

The research and development of emerging technologies, including artificial intelligence (AI), unmanned aerial vehicles (UAV), and the Internet of Things (IoT) and so on, have not only led to lifestyle changes (e.g., one person company) but also facilitated collaborative planning towards a more inclusive approach. To provide an insight into this trend (e.g., technical innovation–lifestyle change–new scenarios–place-making through planning and design) from a socio-technical perspective, we are organizing an international conference, ‘Future Human Habitat in the era of AI’, to be held in Suzhou on 6-7th June 2026. It will look into important issues arising in the urban–rural transition processes worldwide, mainly focusing on five themes:

Sustainability: nature-based solutions that can facilitate the green, low-carbon transition from a socio-technical perspective;

Informatics: data-driven approaches that lead to innovative planning/design paradigms in the era of Human–AI;

Entrepreneurship and Management: innovation in urban/rural planning, design, and governance in response to new socio-economic patterns (e.g., low-altitude economy) from a whole-lifecycle perspective;

Social Inclusion: moving from a top-down planning/design approach towards ‘participatory design’ and/or ‘collaborative decision-making’ processes (a.k.a., a bottom-up approach for both human and embodied AI) with support from smart technologies.

Adaptive Design Validated by AI: the innovative application of digital twins and/or AI toolkits to simulate and verify the short- and long-term impact of specific planning/design strategies on building/district/city performance and thereby generate adaptive evidence that can improve human habitat.

This Special Issue would like to call for innovative ideas, case studies of the best practice, and critical discussions on the above themes from global researchers, urban planners and/or designers, architects, and educators. We also welcome any relevant cutting-edge theoretical, empirical, and practical studies that can help us envision a better future.

Submission deadline: 31 October 2026

Period	20 Feb 2026 → 31 Oct 2026
Type of journal	Journal
ISSN	2075-5309
Degree of Recognition	International