Novel Tools and Research Methods: Probing the Sustainable Adaptation-Climate Crisis Nexus

Dear Colleagues,

As technology rapidly advances and extreme weather accelerates the climate crisis, recent novel tools and research methods toward sustainability are expected to evolve and transform. Scholars and experts in allied disciplines engaged in design and planning research on ways to adapt natural and built environments within the climate crisis zeitgeist are deploying novel tools while experimenting with and innovating research methods and approaches that expand the notions of sustainability, adaptation, and resilience. This Special Issue explores interdisciplinary, multidisciplinary, transdisciplinary, and experimental research that represents pioneering methodologies and fosters expanding multivalent knowledge on interrogating impacts of the climate crisis on natural and built environments. The potential for these pioneering studies to inform policy, practice, and future research may be significant. This Special Issue aims to document, disseminate, reveal, and benchmark these novel tools and research methods. This will set a baseline for advancing knowledge and the future deployment of tools and research methods that frame ways to critically investigate the broader sustainable adaptation-climate crisis nexus, particularly in terms of resilient communities, the conservation of cultural and natural resources, visualization, communication, fabrication and prototyping, bio-based or hybrid materials, and robotics, and parametric and computational tactics—all under the umbrella of the sustainable urbanism–climate crisis paradigm. We invite submissions that utilize or develop novel tools and innovative methods investigating the complex interplay between sustainable adaptation and the climate crisis. These novel tools may include but are not limited to visualization, communication, and representation; regenerative/generative Artificial Intelligence; data science and social media; ethnography; various remote and field mapping; innovations in AR, VR, and robotics; unpiloted aerial vehicles; self-autonomous vehicles; and predictive and experimental instruments and research methods.We welcome original research articles, review papers, case studies, and methodological contributions. Submissions should be theoretically grounded, methodologically rigorous, and relevant to the theme of this Special Issue. Studies that examine the notions of sustainability at the intersection of the current climate crisis nexus of global warming/resilient communities and/or sustainable paradigms, whether to generate new tactics and tools for visualizing, communicating, designing, or planning purpose-built environments; conserving or preserving cultural heritage or a collective memory whether subterranean, hidden, or in a ruined state; analyzes socio-cultural phenomena for communities harmed by extreme weather events through data science or data-driven strategies; biodiversity and its enhancement, conservation, restoration, or reclamation; or other related experimental and innovative approaches, are encouraged. The overall objective is to reveal new discoveries through current novel tools and innovations in research methods, applied or basic, and set a benchmark for future research. We look forward to receiving your contributions.  

Dr. Mary Padua
Dr. Zhifang Wang
Guest Editors

Manuscript Submission Information

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Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a single-blind peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Sustainability is an international peer-reviewed open access semimonthly journal published by MDPI.

Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 2400 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.

• novel tools and technology
• innovations and experiments in research methods
• adaptative urbanism-climate crisis nexus
• resilient communities
• social justice and cultural heritage
• balancing biodiversity conservation and re-wilding cities
• transdisciplinary/interdisciplinary/multidisciplinary approaches
• machine learning and deep learning