Yuxiang Chen

Yuxiang Chen is a PhD student at Yale Center for Ecosystems + Architecture, where his research focuses on robotic programming, digital fabrication, and engineering design solutions addressing climate change and energy dynamics. Prior to his enrollment at Yale, Yuxiang worked at Harrison Atelier as a project manager, leading the design and AI team for Pollinators Pavilion and other projects that are related to multi-species design and sustainability. As a robotic research fellow at Pratt Institute, he facilitated the robotic workshop in MS Arch first-year design studio and joined the Pratt team “Exist” in the 2022 Venice Biennale. Yuxiang holds a Master of Science in Architecture from Pratt Institute (US), and a Bachelor of Architecture from Tongji University (China).

Project Summary

3D additive manufacturing has drawn notable attention in the research of architecture and engineering construction due to its versatile potential in mutable geometry shaping and multiple material selections. Processes, such as extrusion with robotic arms, bring design one step further to conventional additive manufacturing, enabling access to the challenging sites and building conditions which become increasingly common as climate change marks the built environment. Framing architecture as a habitat for all species rather than a machine for human life, my research proposes to explore the design and fabrication of ecological modules that serve not only as architectural prefabrication components but also function as basic ecology solutions for enhanced biodiversity in urban environments. This ecological module concept leverages the time-cost efficiency benefit from prefabrication, the access to inaccessible sites through robotic extrusion, and integrates biodiversity sensing and monitoring, allowing novel approaches to adaptive reuse of the urban fabric. My dissertation proposes to develop robotic fabrication for prefab modular systems that sustain urban biodiversity and builds on my extensive experience in robotic fabrication and sensing with IoT.

Research Area Keywords

Robotic Fabrication, Biomaterials, Sensing with IoT, Adaptive Systems, Multispecies