Center for AI for the Built Environment
Nora El-Gohary (CEE)
Mani Golparvar Fard (CEE)
Research Problem
As the National Academy of Engineering notes, “society faces the formidable challenge of modernizing the fundamental structures that will support our civilization in the centuries ahead.” However, current design, construction, and maintenance practices within the built environment suffer from persistent inefficiencies. The deteriorating condition of the nation’s aging infrastructure – combined with these inefficiencies – has cascading impacts: amplifying vulnerabilities to extreme events, increasing health and safety risks, and undermining economic well-being. Overcoming these challenges requires more than conventional AI research or siloed efforts within architecture, engineering, and construction (AEC) or within foundational AI communities. It demands new convergent AI methods capable of reasoning across high-stakes, complex, and deeply contextual environments. For example, while capturing observations – such as using drone imagery to inspect existing conditions – has become easier, acting on those observations remains difficult. Infrastructure is safety-critical, so the cost of error can be high. Interpretation of physical conditions is also complicated by site-specific conditions, varying local codes and regulations, and long timescales of deterioration, all of which shape how data should be understood. Unlike traditional AI domains, generating actionable insights for the built environment requires the integration of multimodal, heterogeneous data (e.g., text, images, BIM, sensor data), as well as a deep understanding of domain-specific knowledge (e.g., mechanics, economics, codes and standards, project controls). Current AI methods are not well-suited to operate effectively under these complex, high-risk, and context-sensitive conditions.
Center on AI for the Built Environment Vision
We aim to establish a Center on AI for the Built Environment to cement the University of Illinois as the world’s leading AI hub for research, innovation, education, and technology transfer in this critical domain. Our goal is to foster convergent AI research that accelerates foundational discoveries, drives transformative technologies, and cultivates a highly skilled technical workforce to support efficient, resilient, and sustainable design, construction, and maintenance of buildings and infrastructure systems. With a strong Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering, School of Computing and Data Science, and Technology Entrepreneur Center in the Grainger College of Engineering, Illinois is uniquely positioned to lead this transformative vision at the intersection of AI and the built environment. Our strengths in supercomputing (NCSA), architecture, and social sciences further reinforce our capacity for interdisciplinary innovation. Our team brings together an unparalleled combination of expertise to address these complex, high-impact challenges.
Larger Impact
The Center will establish Illinois as a global driver of impact in AI for the Built Environment, delivering transformative solutions to advance infrastructure resilience, sustainability, efficiency, and workforce development. The Center will be organized into four thrusts, each integrating research, education, and workforce development: (1) AI for design and engineering; (2) AI for construction; (3) AI for sustainable operation and proactive maintenance; and (4) AI security and ethics.