Prof Ronita BARDHAN

Principal Investigator

Prof Ronita Bardhan is Associate Professor of Sustainable Built Environment at the Department of Architecture, University of Cambridge. Her research focuses on the data-driven design of built environments that reduce health and energy burdens. Dr Bardhan’s research combines architectural engineering, AI and machine learning with social sciences to develop built environment design solutions. She has developed novel methods to inform building and city design by combining physics-based building design optimisation with qualitative socio-economic, socio-cultural norms, occupant behaviour and community norms data.

She has expertise in data-driven design for developing context-specific solutions in the affordable housing sector. She currently works on humid heat health burdens and has conducted heat-health research projects in the diverse socio-economic settings of tropical countries like India, Ethiopia, and Indonesia. She is the Director of the MPhil in Architecture and Urban Studies (MAUS) and leads the Sustainable Design Group at the University of Cambridge. Her impactful work on developing design solutions for reducing the burdens of tuberculosis, heat health and poor indoor air quality in social housing has found immense traction with policymakers.

She advises government departments and agencies on energy efficiency and heat health in affordable housing, has recently been interviewed by the World Economic Forum about heat in built environments, and has written over 130 academic articles on the health and environmental design of the affordable residential built environment.

Cambridge

Researchers

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