The International Building Performance Simulation Association-USA (IBPSA-USA) recognized Nan “Nancy” Ma, assistant professor of architectural engineering in the Department of Civil, Environmental, and Architectural Engineering, with the Emerging Contributor Award during its flagship conference, SimBuild, in Minneapolis last month. This selective and prestigious award recognizes early-career individuals who have demonstrated exceptional promise and strong potential to make significant contributions to the field of building simulation.
Ma’s research challenges the conventional boundaries of building performance simulation by shifting the focus from buildings as energy systems to buildings as human-supporting systems. Her work integrates building science, artificial intelligence, behavioral modeling, and health-oriented design to understand how design and operation decisions shape human comfort, health, adaptive behavior, and resilience under climate stress.
“I am deeply honored to receive the IBPSA-USA Emerging Contributor Award,” Ma said. “Building simulation has long helped us understand how buildings use energy and how performance can be improved. I hope my work can help expand that conversation to ask how building design and operation decisions affect people’s comfort, health, and decisions. Occupants cannot be viewed as just schedules, loads, or assumptions in a model. They are people making decisions shaped by comfort needs, energy costs, health risks, and the practical limits of the buildings they live and work in.”
Ma said she is especially inspired by the potential to bring AI, community knowledge, and building simulation together to create a new generation of human-centered models that learn not only from sensors, drawings, images, and data, but also from people’s experiences and needs.
IBPSA-USA is the United States affiliate of the International Building Performance Simulation Association, the leading global organization dedicated to advancing the science of building performance simulation.
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