Robotics in the construction industry is leading to a revolution

As our means of production change with new technologies, so will our architectural designs and future construction sites for the built environment. 

The construction sector is currently faced with an urgent necessity for change. A new approach to the construction site of the future must be taken. Apart from this, the construction sector has not yet taken advantage of the digital revolution that is happening in other domains. Automation, Robotics, and AI is expected to increase productivity in the construction sector, to open new opportunities for design and for increased building performance. To tackle this goal, four different disciplines come together to solve the challenge the discipline of Construction Robotics presents.

Construction Robotics addresses the emerging application of robotics in the domain of construction and demolition, linking the rapidly growing community of robotic researchers with those in architecture and civil engineering. To that end it covers all stages of robotic automation: from pre-fabrication of customized large scale parts through on-site assembly and inspection to refurbishment and demolition to controlled deconstruction.  It covers research and applications of robotic assembly, prefabrication and disassembly in construction settings; robotic site mapping and real-time vision; material handling systems; social, environmental and legislative implications of construction robotics; and more.

The domain includes: 

- Design for robotic construction

- Integration of robotics into construction processes

- Metrology, automated inspection and monitoring

- Robotic assembly and disassembly, robotic prefabrication

- Adaptive systems for inhomogeneous material handling/processing

- Control of (semi)-autonomous robots, flexible programming, human-robot collaboration

- Environment mapping and recognition, real-time vision, sensor fusion

- Heavy duty robot platforms, specialised robot systems for construction

- Studies of construction robot systems

- Social, environmental, and legislative implications of construction robotics.

Construction Robotics favours a cross-disciplinary approach of reporting on applications and providing state-of-the-art knowledge, techniques and methods of robotics in the broadest sense. It complements the transformation processes of emerging robotic research and applications, and redefines cross-disciplinary work in an era of global digitalisation and knowledge transfer.

Prof. Sigrid Brell-Cokcan is the editor in chief of the journal Construction Robotics,https://www.springer.com/journal/41693  She is the founder and director of the new Chair of Individualized Production (IP) at RWTH Aachen University and is currently the president of the Association for Robots in Architecture (RiA) and on the Board of Directors of euRobotics. Before launching her own architecture firm II Architects int Istanbul/ Vienna in 2003 she was working with renowned international architects and engineers e.g. Coop Himmelblau, Frank O Gehry, Peter Cook and Bollinger & Grohmann on renowend projects such as Kunsthaus Graz, MARTA Herford, Musée des Confluences Lyon and BMW World Munich. In the last years she has been pioneering the easy use of industrial robots for the creative industry while participating in international research and industry projects. The Association for Robots in Architecture is a KUKA and Autodesk developing partner and a validated EU research institution under the FP7 program. In 2016 Sigrid Brell-Cokcan joined forces of RiA with euRobotics and co-founded the new Topic Group for Construction Robotics within Europe´s biggest public private partnership SPARC to contribute to the Multi Annual Roadmap(MAR) for robotic research within Horizon Europe. Since 2019 she has been serving on the Board of Directors. of euRobotics. As another result the new scientific Springer Journal on Construction Robotics was launched with her as chief editor in 2017. At RWTH Aachen University Sigrid´s new professorship for Individualized Production focusses on the use of innovative machinery in material and building production. In order to create an environment that allows the efficient, individualized production of lot size one, new and user friendly methods for man machine interaction are developed. The Chair of IP employs researchers from different fields of robotics and building production to streamline the necessary digital workflow from the initial design to the production process; shaping the construction site of the future via intuitive, easy-to-use interfaces. A recent development is the successful implementation of „haptic programming“ on a sensitive KUKA LBR iiwa robot, which was presented to the public at Hannover Fair by RWTH Aachen as one of the finalists for the KUKA Innovation Award 2016. In 2018 Sigrid Brell-Cokcan co-founded the cross-faculty Center for Construction Robotics (CCR) on RWTH Aachen Campus to focus on the automation in construction with key industry leaders along the construction industry value chain. A new international master degree in Construction robotics for architecture, computer science, structural and mechanical engineering will start in 2020 to allow the new proliferation of the future digital construction engineers.