Smart environments offer a vision of unobtrusive interaction with our surroundings, interpreting and anticipating our needs. One key aspect for making environments smart is the ability to recognize the current context. However, like any human space, smart environments are subject to changes and mutations of their purposes and their composition as people shape their living places according to th...

The design flow for primary-shaped microcomponents and microsystems is presented. As a characteristic of microspecific design, the approach is predominantly driven by technology. To integrate the relevant technological demands and restrictions into the design synthesis for a realizable embodiment design in accordance with the specified function, design rules are defined. These represent mandato...

without the surrounding environment of a site, architecture loses its full meaning. in the evolutionof the design process, a site's environment should be understood as the integral factor within which a designed productor artifact is expected to perform. the environment is not of secondary priority. every building is intertwined with itscontext; context being its physical, visual and ecological...

During the last 2 decades, the effects of the physical and social environment on the healing process, recovery and well-being of patients, families and staff in hospitals have been proved.There is a growing recognition that healthcare architecture could do more by promoting overall wellness, and this requires expanding the focus to healing.The research on evidence-based design (EBD) has demonst...

We present a model of …nancial crises that stem from endogenous complexity. We conceptualize complexity as banks’uncertainty about the …nancial network of cross-exposures. As conditions deteriorate, cross-exposures generate the possibility of a domino e¤ect of bankruptcies. As this happens, banks face an increasingly complex environment since they need to understand a greater fraction of the …n...