Alumni PhD Students

The value of the Ecological Footprint above the current focus on Carbon Footprinting, is that it is a more holistic assessment of sustainability and can readily be communicated to the general public.

The Research compares several building projects that have significant data records from the construction process. The type of data that have been collected are: the delivery notices; water consumption on site; electrical consumption; waste receipts; and then energy consumption during building operation.

I am interested in assessing the underlying data within an Ecological Footprint framework. While I recognise that the LCA and similar methods are more acurrate, the use of the Ecological Footprint, if reasonably accurate, is very useful for public education, which is equally as important a driver for change.

In today's multicultural inclusive social background, the word more  may not only refer to the number of changes, it can be understood as diversity  or multi-levels may be more appropriate here. Because of culture, religion, and even social class, visiting museums is still a big challenge for many people. This research  will focus on studying the challenge visitors group, though some cases to analyze the exhibition narrative design that has been used in the museums and to explore the innovation architecture langue to encourage more challenge visitors to come into museums.

Cultural building typologies have become a fundamental catalytic force governing the urban fabric, responsible for instigating widespread regeneration in cities, and disciplining the surrounding built environment. Whilst they exist as a platform for the individual to express their views and experiences to the wider public, they can also serve as a vessel that preserves anthropological activities through history. These functions suggest the typology has a fundamental connection with society and a civic weight above most other building types. An exploration of the nature of this regenerative effect lies at the heart of this thesis: through an investigation of the typological and urban performances, this doctorate sets out to establish how these institutions have changed the city, and at which points through history. Their civic agency will be explored to identify the disciplinary autonomy of architecture, its agency in urban transformation and its effects on the subject.

Urban parks and green spaces are useful assets that help support the conviviality of cities in diverse ways. This study examines historic and contemporary relationships between urban planning and everyday uses of green space in urban Jakarta to address problems affecting the development of urban green spaces in the context of South East Asia. The case study design was used and special region of Jakarta Central (Indonesia) with two locally renowned park: Taman Menteng and Taman Suropati, selected as the study area. Different qualitative research techniques were employed whilst representatives of green spaces organizations and the local people constituted the study population.

The study revealed the unfortunate state of urban green spaces in Jakarta with factors such as urbanization, poor enforcement of development controls, conflicting land ownership rights on green spaces, and lack of priority to green spaces being among the major causes for that. This problem was further exacerbated by complexity in the governance of green spaces, poor regulation of power among stakeholders, and lack of consensus in decisions on green spaces. Evidence from in-depth interviews with key stakeholders and local park users highlights the diversity and complexity of everyday relationships between urban planning and the use of green space, and shows that changing notions of nature and everyday life can be mapped to show associated urban, social and spatial inequalities. 

Nils Jäger studied Architecture at Technische Universität Berlin (BA) and Ball State University, Muncie, IN, USA (M.Arch.). He completed his PhD on Adaptive Architecture/Responsive Environments in Computer Science at the University of Nottingham. His thesis is titled “Enacted Embodiment in Adaptive Architecture: Physiological Interactions between Inhabitants and Biofeedback Architecture.”

Prior to his doctoral studies, Nils gained professional experience in Dallas, TX, USA, working in a mid-sized architectural office.

Prior to joining the University of Loughborough, Nils was a Research Fellow at the Mixed Reality Laboratory, University of Nottingham, where he investigates the inhabitation of adaptive architecture. Using experimental and “in the wild” research he examines embodiment, actual and perceived control, as well as agency within adaptive environments. He also studies the emerging interactions with architecture made possible by the Internet of Things and the smart home/smart cities paradigm.

Dr. Jing Xiao is assistant professor at the School of Architecture and Urban Planning at Shenzhen University, China. He graduated from the University of Nottingham in 2013 with his dissertation focusing on the transformation of architectural knowledge via pictorial media in pre-modern China. He has published in many international refereed journals including IDEA+, Studies in the History of Gardens & Designed Landscapes, and Habitat International. His recent work on the history of Jesuit architecture in China will be published in the Routledge Handbook on the Reception of Classical Architecture (2019). 

I did my PhD on the research of critically reviewing the conservation of Taiwan's Military Dependants' Villages under Professor Jonathan Hale and Associate Professor Laura Hanks' supervision. The research was related with architectural theories of meaning of space, interpretation and narrative of space.

I participated in a research project about reviewing the development of the landscape in Yilan County, Taiwan as a co-principle investigator after finishing my PhD. After this, I obtained an academic place in the Graduate Institution of Museum Studies, Fu Jen Catholic University as an Assistant Professor.

The main topics currently are:

• Museum Architecture
• Museum and Cities
• and Museum and Cultural Heritage

The main foci of my future research will be related with architecture, cities, heritage and museum studies. The last research project is about adjusting of historical buildings and exhibition of local culture.

Mina joined the department in 2013 on a Dean of Engineering Scholarship and conducted her PhD research on the architectural design thinking process. Whilst at Nottingham, she tutored in the 1^st year RIBA design studio, represented the ACT research group within the faculty and worked within the Graduate School as a coordinator for the Engineering and Science Graduate Centre. Since graduating, Mina joined the Imagine-D. research team at Strathclyde University who investigate the neural and cognitive basis of creative design ideation.

Through a detailed case-study of the work of Japanese architects SANAA, this research investigates the meaning of the term “weak” in the context of architecture, and the role that materiality plays in realising such weakness, focusing primarily on three key material features that have been identified in their work: transparency, thinness, and whiteness. The study investigates materiality from a spatial and social perspective, focusing on the perception and occupation of people in the building. It expands the standard definition of tectonics into a spatial tectonics, which shows a characteristic of ambiguity in SANAA’s case and might ultimately be a reflection of the ambiguity and paradoxes of contemporary society.

She graduated in BA Architecture from the University of Portsmouth, obtained the Master of Architecture (Distinction), and a PhD in Architecture with Dean's Excellence Scholarship from Nottingham. Her thesis is titled “When Exhibitions Become Experiences: the nARration of augmented space inside a science museum” which focuses on the emergent ways of designing the interactive space, and in particular, how educational environments are impacted through the interplay between the digital media space and the physical space, how this overall triggers an important shift in the way people experience, learn and reflect.