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Unit

Human-Oriented Built Environment Lab

Laboratory

Related publications (27)

Overview of the Alaskan Layered Pollution and Chemical Analysis (ALPACA) Field Experiment

Athanasios Nenes, Julia Schmale, Andrea Baccarini, Roman Pohorsky

The Alaskan Layered Pollution And Chemical Analysis (ALPACA) field experiment was a collaborative study designed to improve understanding of pollution sources and chemical processes during winter (cold climate and low-photochemical activity), to investigat ...

2024

Influence of Ventilation on Formation and Growth of 1-20 nm Particles via Ozone-Human Chemistry

Dusan Licina, Shen Yang, Marouane Merizak, Meixia Zhang

Ozone reaction with human surfaces is an important source of ultrafine particles indoors. However, 1-20 nm particles generated from ozone-human chemistry, which mark the first step of particle formation and growth, remain understudied. Ventilation and indo ...

Amer Chemical Soc2024

Building ventilation and outdoor air pollution: Implications for health, comfort and energy

Evangelos Belias

As humans spend most of their time indoors, indoor air quality (IAQ) significantly impacts their health. In parallel, building ventilation consumes significant energy, contributing to climate change. However, the relationships between the building ventilat ...

EPFL2023

Influence of outdoor air pollution on European residential ventilative cooling potential

Dusan Licina, Evangelos Belias

Residential ventilative cooling via natural ventilation is influenced by outdoor air pollution. However, relative to climate, outdoor air pollution is not comprehensively considered in determining the ventilative cooling potential of buildings. To assess t ...

ELSEVIER SCIENCE SA2023

Assessment of Monitoring Strategies for Inhalation Exposure and Occupancy in Office Environments

Seoyeon Yun

Given people's significant time spent indoors, ensuring good indoor air quality (IAQ) is essential because it significantly influences occupants' health and productivity. Office buildings consume about 50% of commercial building energy and 18% of total bui ...

EPFL2023

Size-resolved inhalation intake fractions for particles released from human activities in residential indoor environments

Dusan Licina, Marouane Merizak

Inhalation exposure to elevated concentrations of airborne particulate matter is a public health concern. Assessment of exposure can be enhanced through better knowledge of source-receptor relationships, which can be characterized through the inhalation in ...

PERGAMON-ELSEVIER SCIENCE LTD2023

Energy, SBS symptoms, and productivity in Swiss open-space offices: Economic evaluation of standard, actual, and optimum scenarios

Dolaana Khovalyg, Dusan Licina, Verena Marie Barthelmes, Arnab Chatterjee, Cecile Anne Berquand

The fundamental aspiration of new-generation high-performing buildings is to reduce energy use while securing indoor environmental quality conducive to human health and productivity. However, existing frameworks for identifying Key Performance Indicators ( ...

PERGAMON-ELSEVIER SCIENCE LTD2023

A new chapter of healthy indoor air: antiviral air treatments

Shannon Christa David

Aerosol transmission remains a major challenge for the control of respiratory viruses. To date, prevention strategies include masks, vaccinations, physical distancing, travel restrictions, and lockdowns. Such measures are effective but come with heavy soci ...

Wiley2023

DIET Controller: Dynamic Indoor Environment using Deep Reinforcement Learning

Arnab Chatterjee

Heating, Ventilation, and Air Conditioning (HVAC) Systems utilize much energy, accounting for 40% of total building energy use. The temperatures in buildings are commonly held within narrow limits, leading to higher energy use. Measurements from office bui ...

EPFL2023

Efficacy of temporal and spatial abstraction for training accurate machine learning models: A case study in smart thermostats

Rachid Guerraoui, Alexandre David Olivier Maurer

Smart thermostats are increasingly popular in homes and buildings as they improve occupant comfort, lower energy use in heating and cooling systems, and reduce utility bills by automatically adjusting room temperature according to measurements of their bui ...

ELSEVIER SCIENCE SA2023

Optimal sensor placement for personal inhalation exposure detection in static and dynamic office environments

Dusan Licina, Seoyeon Yun

Modern health and productivity concerns related to air pollutant exposure in buildings have sparked the need for occupant-centric monitoring and ventilation control. The existing personal exposure monitoring is often restricted to stationary air quality se ...

PERGAMON-ELSEVIER SCIENCE LTD2023

Experimental study of the hydrodynamic and thermal performances of ventilated wall structures

Dolaana Khovalyg, Mohammad Rahiminejad

The presence of a ventilated air gap behind the external cladding in a building envelope is known to have a tangible contribution to the overall performance of the wall assembly. In the present study, the hydrodynamic and thermal performances of ventilated ...

2023

Transparent structured conductive coating for applications in smart windows

Jérémy Jacques Antonin Fleury

Solar radiation reaching the surface of the earth for a period of one hour contains more energy than that consumed by mankind over an entire year. Some of this solar energy is already collected by photovoltaic cells to cover the electricity needs of buildi ...

EPFL2023

RECA: A Multi-Task Deep Reinforcement Learning-Based Recommender System for Co-Optimizing Energy, Comfort and Air Quality in Commercial Buildings

Andrew James Sonta

We present the design and implementation of RECA, a novel human-centric recommender system for co-optimizing energy consumption, comfort and air quality in commercial buildings. Existing works generally optimize these objectives separately, or by only cont ...

Association for Computing Machinery2023

Dynamic indoor thermal environment using Reinforcement Learning-based controls: Opportunities and challenges

Dolaana Khovalyg, Arnab Chatterjee

Currently, the indoor thermal environment in many buildings is controlled by conventional control techniques that maintain the indoor temperature within a prescribed deadband. The latest research provides evidence that more dynamic variations of the indoor ...

2023

Adequacy of stationary measurements as proxies for residential personal exposure to gaseous and particle air pollutants

Dusan Licina, Maria Viviana Gonzalez Serrano

People are exposed to myriad of airborne pollutants in their homes. Owing to diverse potential sources of air pollution and human activity patterns, accurate assessment of residential exposures is complex. In this study, we explored the relationship betwee ...

ACADEMIC PRESS INC ELSEVIER SCIENCE2023

Influence of Ambient Air Pollution on Natural Ventilation Potential in Europe

Dusan Licina, Evangelos Belias

When designed and operated adequately, natural ventilation (NV) can improve the buildings' energy efficiency and indoor environmental quality. There is a plethora of factors that limit the effectiveness of NV, such as the climate, surrounding buildings, no ...

AMER SOC HEATING, REFRIGERATING AND AIR-CONDITIONING ENGS2022

Outdoor PM2.5 air filtration: optimising indoor air quality and energy

Dusan Licina, Evangelos Belias

Human inhalation exposure to fine particulate matter (PM2.5), including the PM2.5 of outdoor origin, predominantly occurs indoors. To limit outdoor PM2.5 penetration into buildings, ventilation standards often require the filtration of outdoor air with a m ...

2022

Measuring the effective thermal resistance of ventilated air-spaces behind common wall assemblies: Theoretical uncertainty analysis and recommendations for the hot box method modifications (ASHRAE 1759-RP)

Dolaana Khovalyg, Mohammad Rahiminejad

A well-designed ventilated wall that incorporates air-space behind cladding can reduce energy use for conditioning buildings by adding a thermally resistive layer. The scarcity of thermal performance data and standardized test methods is a particular barri ...

2022

Impact of the ventilated air-space behind traditional (passive) and BIPV (active) façades on the thermo-hydrodynamic performance of the building wall structures

Mohammad Rahiminejad

For many decades, ventilated cavities in wall assemblies of buildings have been essential for creating moisture-resilient constructions by allowing airflow within the air gap to promote drying. In addition to that, the airflow in the cavity can contribute ...

EPFL2022