Masoud Gheisari

• PhD, Georgia Tech
• Professor (Associate) at University of Florida

The rise of robot use in the construction industry underscores the need to prepare the next generation of construction professionals for this technological shift. While knowledge about these robots is vital, understanding their operational mechanisms and the safety challenges they pose on construction sites is equally essential. However, implementi...

In the architecture, engineering, and construction (AEC) fields, computing and information technologies play an increasingly prevalent and complex role in day-today work. Consequently, educators must adjust and, in many cases, reimagine curricula and teaching methodologies to adapt to the changing landscape. Past research efforts led by the ASCE Co...

Drones are increasingly being used in construction for various applications. However, this integration has increased interactions between drones and workers, posing significant safety challenges for workers. This paper assessed the physical risks of drones on construction sites using VR-based 4D simulations. Roofs, ladders, and scaffolds were ident...

Drones have had a significant impact on the construction industry. However, their safety implications on construction jobsites are yet to be explored. This user-centered study empirically investigates whether drone presence is associated with any physiological, attentional, and emotional impact on humans, particularly those working at heights who a...

This paper discusses a recent educational effort to develop interdisciplinary educational projects within the construction curriculum through a research-oriented undergraduate honors course. Second semester freshman honors students from different fields (e.g., construction, architecture, engineering, computer science) developed a social drone featu...

Traditional methods of delivering construction information, relying on paper-based shop drawings, specifications , and verbal instructions, often lead to increased mental workload, error rates, and difficulties in accessing information. This raises the question of how the traditional approach to accessing design and construction information on cons...

There has been a large increase in the deployment of drones in construction, and it is expected that there will be more interaction between construction professionals and drones on construction sites. Working in close proximity to these flying robots raises novel occupational safety and health issues that might make the construction industry more d...

Integrating drones into already dangerous construction sites could expose workers to additional risks and make construction sites more dangerous than before. Several studies have identified various safety challenges of using drones on jobsites. However, limited studies have focused on educating construction workers about the safety challenges of th...

Construction is one of the most dangerous industries for people on jobsites all around the world. In response, safety training has been employed to address safety hazards proactively. However, training that utilizes traditional media (e.g., texts, images, videos) is ineffective due to its passiveness. Virtual reality (VR) –based safety training can...

Drones continue to support the growth of the construction industry; however, activities that use drones for K-12 education are still minimal and exploratory. Particularly, no studies have explored the use of drone technologies to attract students towards construction disciplines. The contribution of this study centers on better understanding how dr...

Drones are being widely deployed in construction, and the interaction between them and construction professionals is expected to increase even more in the future. However, the deployment of these aerial robots near construction professionals could be associated with additional risks affecting the safety and health of the workplace. This study explo...

Utilizing drones on construction sites could put workers who are already in dangerous environments into even more risky situations. Therefore, researchers have explored the safety challenges and their countermeasures regarding drone integration into construction sites. This study proposes using a 360-degree virtual reality (360VR) training environm...

Trends in the construction domain, educational enrollment, student graduation, student industry employment, and workforce retention demonstrate that minorities—Hispanics, African Americans, Asian Americans, and Native Americans—are often excluded, segregated, or ignored in this domain. A systematic literature review (N = 68) was conducted to invest...

To prepare graduates for the dynamic and complex working environment in the architecture, engineering, and construction (AEC) industry, educational institutions have distinctly emphasized the significance of communication skills. Field trips are a widely utilized strategy to provide students with a situated learning setting where students can commu...

Equipping unmanned aerial systems (UASs) with light detection and ranging (lidar) has been made possible with recent advancements , which has made these sensors compact and gradually more cost-effective. Despite the increased proliferation of UAS-lidar in several fields, the geometric accuracy of lidar-generated point clouds, together with their vi...

This study develops a framework for unmanned aerial systems (UASs) to monitor fall hazard prevention systems near unprotected edges and openings in high-rise building projects. A three-step machine-learning-based framework was developed and tested to detect guardrail posts from the images captured by UAS. First, a guardrail detector was trained to...

The use of drones in the construction industry has been dramatically growing in different areas such as building inspection, site mapping, and safety monitoring. The increasing deployment of drones in construction leads to more collaboration and interaction between human workers and drones. This raises novel occupational safety issues, especially f...

Construction professionals need to understand collaboration within the context of jobsites. Consequently, many construction programs utilize learning activities to enable student learning of collaboration. One of those key learning activities used by construction programs is site visits. Although site visits are greatly beneficial for students, the...

Site visits or field trips have been a tool utilized by construction educators to engage students in active learning, assist traditional lessons, and attain stronger and deeper student learning experiences. Nevertheless, site visits present major logistical and accessibility challenges for educational institutions and instructors, reducing the numb...

"The use of drones in construction grew exponentially over the last few years, making the construction industry one of the fastest commercial adopters of this technology. Drones are widely used in the construction industry for a wide variety of applications (e.g., site surveying/mapping, earthwork volumetrics, safety inspection, progress monitoring...

"Poor safety and low productivity have pushed the construction industry to increase the use of technology and automation. Consequently, robotic systems such as aerial and ground robots are becoming increasingly popular in modern construction sites. As construction is still a heavily human-driven industry, these robots need to collaborate, interact,...

Online safety training is an increasingly utilized tool to deliver flexible learning opportunities for workers in the construction industry. Traditionally, online safety training relies mainly on text and images for delivering trainee learning and assessment methodologies. This study investigates the use of online virtual reality (VR) environments...

Increasingly, online safety training has been used in the construction industry to reduce costs, save time, and offer workers flexible learning opportunities. This type of training utilizes safety videos to demonstrate unsafe behaviors and increase worker awareness of hazards. However, directing trainee attention to hazardous conditions within vide...

"The need to increase the number of science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) students has been stressed, yet the growing number of students still fails the national demand for the STEM workforce. This mismatch between supply and demand is also found in the construction field. Storytelling can be a potential solution to this problem,...

"Construction professionals have started exploring several UAS configurations and techniques to ideally enhance the quality of the UAS-derived point clouds. This study aims at evaluating the factors [i.e., single-frequency GPS (L1), dual-frequency GPS (L1/L2), post-processing kinematic (PPK) georeferencing technique] affecting the accuracy of UAS-d...

"As drone-mediated building inspection gains interest among the inspection disciplines and becomes more standardized in the industry, current construction, engineering, and management (CEM) students are encouraged to develop and enhance their drone flight operational skills. While integrating hands-on building inspection training using drones in th...

The significantly increased usage of Unmanned Aerial Systems (UASs) and photogrammetry technologies in the construction industry underlines the need to integrate such technologies within the educational curricula. This paper presents the lessons learned from a recent effort to integrate a UAS-Photogrammetry module in a technology-based construction...

Site visits or field trips are widely recognized by construction educators to engage students in active learning, supplement traditional lessons, and achieve better student learning experiences. However, site visits pose significant logistical and accessibility challenges for educational institutions and teachers, limiting the number of students wh...

Integrating drones into construction sites can introduce new risks to workers who already work in hazardous environments. Consequently, several recent studies have investigated the safety challenges and solutions associated with this technology integration in construction. However, there is a knowledge gap about effectively communicating such safet...

Field trips are widely recognized as an essential educational component to connect classrooms with the real world. When students don't have access to real field trips, virtual ones have been developed by educators and researchers. Pedagogical agents have been applied to serve as a tour guide and educational tool that facilitate students learning in...

This paper is aimed at exploring rules for construction accident prevention based on unsafe behaviors. The literature review demonstrates a clear connection between construction accident prevention and unsafe behaviors, followed by a 2-year field investigation resulting in 2207 observations based on convenient sampling with 95% confidence and 5% li...

"The use of drones in construction grew exponentially over the last few years, making the construction industry one of the fastest commercial adopters of drones. Drones are widely used in the construction industry for applications such as aerial mapping, safety and quality inspection, job site logistics, and progress monitoring. The integration of...

"Drones’ recent advancements, distinctive flying capabilities, and ability to efficiently accomplish tasks have allowed these platforms to shift from passively following humans’ control commands to actively collaborating and interacting with other robots and construction personnel on jobsites. This shift has highlighted the need for advanced resear...

"Site visits or field trips have been a tool utilized by construction engineering and management educators to engage students in active learning, assist traditional lessons, and attain stronger and deeper student learning experiences. Nevertheless, site visits present major logistical and accessibility challenges, which reduces the number of studen...

"Effective communication is essential for students in construction management and relevant fields. Nevertheless, very little emphasis on communication practices has been placed in the construction management curriculum, and limited communication skills are still widely found among students. Ideal construction site visits not only supplement traditi...

Collaborative problem-solving skills are required from learners in the 21st century, particularly in construction graduates upon entering the workforce. However, challenges associated with spatiotemporal contexts of construction sites and resource limitations of educational programs reduce the opportunities available for students to practice these...

The construction industry is witnessing significant growth in drone applications, ranging from site mapping and surveying and progress monitoring to safety monitoring and structure inspection and maintenance. Drones’ recent technological advancements and successful integration with other technologies, along with their ability to accomplish tasks sa...

Over the last decade, there is an ever-increasing demand for automation in construction to counter the major challenges of low productivity and lack of skilled labor that have marred the construction industry for years. As a result, modern construction jobsites will feature several aerial robotic systems working side by side with human workers. The...

Unmanned aerial systems (UASs) have rapidly permeated architecture, engineering, construction, and operations (AECO) practices over the past several years, and projections indicate the continued growth of their use within these fields beyond the foreseeable future. New generations of UASs also require minimal human involvement, leading to lower job...

Although it is projected to have significant employment growth in the electrical construction industry, there are not enough young people to join the workforce. It is indispensable for the future of work in construction to explore emerging technologies and effectively attract the younger generation to the construction industry. This paper explores...

Building science employs student-professional interactions to increase the learning and engagement of domain topics. Although these interactions are beneficial to students, labor shortages and automation trends will create barriers to expose students to professionals in the future. One solution is to utilize virtual situated learning contexts for s...

The use of Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs) in construction is growing at an unprecedented level, making the construction industry one of the fastest commercial adopters of UAVs. UAVs are widely used through different phases of construction, from aerial mapping, safety and quality monitoring and site logistics to structural inspection and maintenanc...

With recent changes by the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) opening the possibility of more areas for drones to be used, such as delivery, there will be increasingly more intera ctions between humans and drones soon. Although current human drone interaction (HDI) investigate what factors are necessary for safe interactions, very few has focuse...

Purpose-This study aims to explore DroneSim, a virtual reality (VR)-based flight training simulator, as an alternative for real-world drone-mediated building inspection training. Design/methodology/approach-Construction, engineering and management students were asked to pilot drones in the VR-based DroneSim space and perform common flight operati...

The reality of COVID-19 public health concerns and increasing demand for distance education have forced educators to move to online delivery of their courses. Particularly in construction education, the majority of physical location-based educational activities (e.g., labs, site visits, or field trips) have been canceled during the pandemic that re...

This research studied the use of cinemagraphs for online training purposes to enhance the hazard recognition of construction "struck-by" hazards. Cinemagraphs (i.e., partially animated videos that loop over time) have been identified as an effective method to direct attention in video content, making it potentially beneficial in remote construction...

Construction professionals require to use problem-solving skills to resolve issues on projects. However, there are limited opportunities for students to practice problem-solving skills within real-world contexts. This research explored the use of iVisit-360-degree panoramic site visits supported by virtual humans for learning problem-solving skills...

Purpose-The purpose of this research is to explore how to visually represent human decision-making processes during the performance of indoor building inspection flight operations using drones. Design/methodology/approach-Data from expert pilots were collected using a virtual reality drone flight simulator. The expert pilot data were studied to i...

Two-dimensional (2D) drawing is one of the most common communication approaches in the civil and construction engineering domain. However, there are limits to the traditional classroom setting for training in 2D drawing and interpretation skills. New visualization techniques exist for integrating the third dimension (depth) to 2D drawings, providin...

Unmanned Aerial Systems (UASs) have rapidly been integrated into the construction industry over the past few years, and their application is continually growing in this domain. The recent development in UAS regulations and technical capabilities have played a significant role in their popularity and wide deployment in various stages of the construc...

Unmanned Aerial Systems (UASs) have recently been utilized as an efficient safety inspection and monitoring tool on construction jobsites. However, their deployment could potentially result in hazardous situations such as worker distraction or struck-by accidents. This paper introduces iSafeUAS as an initial effort to develop and assess a platform...

Construction researchers and professionals have shown increased interest and need to enhance the accuracy of unmanned aerial system (UAS)-generated point cloud data (PCD) and ideally improve this technology's integration within construction practices. High-accuracy PCD are required for a variety of construction practices, including building surveyi...

The construction field trip is an interactive and essential component of construction education, and its significance is widely recognized by educators and researchers in the construction domain. However, due to its real-world nature, there are several challenges that limit the extensive employment of this teaching approach. A few examples of such...

This research conducted a case study to understand the use of omnidirectional cinemagraphs for training purposes, enhancing the hazard-recognition of construction struck-by hazards. Traditional lecture-based training using classroom teaching was compared to virtual reality omnidirectional cinemagraph-based training employing a head-mounted display....

Site visits or field trips are an integral part of construction management education, providing students with experiential learning of jobsite conditions. However, these types of real-world opportunities are difficult to obtain within the current educational framework based on classroom instruction. To expose students to jobsite spatiotemporal cont...

The use of drones or unmanned aerial vehicles for indoor building inspection tasks requires users to understand flight patterns (e.g., flight routes, camera focus points, target approach strategies) for maneuvering the aircraft. This study focuses on exploring the visual representation of human behaviors performing indoor building inspection flight...

Purpose: The architecture, engineering and construction (AEC) industry exists in a dynamic environment and requires several stakeholders to communicate regularly. However, evidence indicates current communication practices fail to meet the requirements of increasingly complex projects. With the advent of Industry 4.0, a trend is noted to create a d...

Unmanned Aerial Systems (UASs), a.k.a. drones, are flying agents that operate under remote control without a pilot on board. One emerging technique for using UASs in the construction industry is applying photogrammetry methods to visual data acquired by the UAS. Within the last decade, researchers have heavily focused on developing computer vision...

Safety training in the United States construction industry commonly employs classroom-based lecture and storytelling techniques to transfer knowledge to workers and professionals. However, low levels of engagement and low-fidelity representations of the construction jobsites have posed limitations for learners to easily visualize and understand haz...

Featured Application In this paper, we propose a position and orientation approach that reduces the image transformation phenomena in advance (i.e., process modification). Thus, this approach which integrates with image matching techniques that have limitations dealing with image transformation (i.e., result modification) could be valuable. The adv...

The majority of construction fatalities and accidents in Chile occur in high-rise building construction projects that also suffer from an insufficient number of safety managers on-site. Unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) and their generated aerial visual contents have the potential to help the limited number of safety managers in such projects to quic...

The digitalization of the construction industry has immense potential for dramatically improving the industry’s practices. Concerning current measures in construction project management, the industry is still dependent on traditional construction methods. However, the application of fully automated techniques within the construction industry has no...

Omnidirectional images have seen increasing usage in virtual tours to display remote destinations. These applications use markers or landmarks within the images to drive user interaction. Viewers must be able to efficiently locate and interact with markers for a positive user experience that retains immersion. However, the effect of marker position...

Unmanned Aerial Systems (UASs) are aircraft without human pilots on board. Initially intended for military purposes, over the years their civilian use has gained wide popularity and acceptance. The fast-growing UAS market has stimulated the expansion of its application in various sectors of the economy, including construction. In recent years, vari...

Despite the advancement of technologies and tools used to design and display building elements in construction, design communication on construction sites still heavily relies on 2-dimensional drawings. Paper-based floor plans often reference other paper drawings to deliver design intent to construction site crews. This complicated process sometime...

Virtual reality (VR)-based approaches have been used to facilitate safety knowledge transfer and increase hazard awareness by providing safe and controlled experiences of unsafe scenarios in construction safety training applications. However, the long development times and high computational costs associated with existing VR methods have posed sign...

The digitalisation of the construction industry fuels the application of sophisticated virtual product models. Concerning current measures in construction project management, the acquisition of sufficient data and information hinders the project execution. However, the application of fully automated techniques within the construction industry is no...

Purpose: Three dimensional (3 D) laser scanner surveying is widely used in many fields, such as agriculture, mining and heritage documentation and can be of great benefit for as-built documentation in construction and facility management domains. However, there is lack of applied research and use cases integrating 3 D laser scanner surveying with...

Purpose: Remotely piloted aircraft (RPA) systems have emerged as an established tool within the construction industry. Concurrent with this trend has been the rise in research on RPA, establishing this as a new field of study within the construction management domain. What is needed now is an assessment of the current state of research in this emer...

Over the last decade, researchers have used virtual- and mixed-reality (VR-MR) techniques for various safety-related applications such as training, hazard monitoring, and preconstruction planning. This paper reviews the recent trends in virtual- and mixed-reality applications in construction safety, explicitly focusing on virtual-reality and mixed-...

The recent increase in the integration of unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) in civilian usage stems mainly from modern technological advancements and the devices’ abilities to accomplish civilian tasks in a quick, safe, and cost-efficient manner. One sector that witnessed tremendous UAV impact is the Architecture, Engineering, and Construction (AEC)...

Virtual reality (VR)-based approaches have been used to facilitate safety knowledge transfer and increase hazard awareness by providing safe and controlled experiences of unsafe scenarios for construction safety training applications. However, high computational costs, long development times, and the limited sense of presence and realism associated...

The unmanned aerial system (UAS), as an emerging technology that can be used as a vehicle in a variety of settings, has the potential to strongly affect safety performance. UASs can move faster than humans into inaccessible , hard-to-reach, and unsafe areas of jobsites and can be equipped with various types of sensors to transfer valuable data to s...

360-degree panorama is a reality capturing technique for visualizing environments that fully immerses the user in a true-to-reality representation of real-world spaces. 360-degree panoramas create highly realistic and detailed replication of construction sites while giving users a high sense of presence. This paper aims to discuss the applications...

Obtaining information from a volumetric data is possible from a set of data points in space, called a 'point cloud' and this paper aims at comparing the point cloud data generated from 360 Panoramic Photogrammetry technique as an alternative to common Laser Scanning techniques. 360-degree panoramas capture all directions and efficiently cover a ful...

To avoid accidents on site, safety planning plays a crucial role in the construction domain. It consists of risk identification and making proper decisions about the safety measures required to be implemented during the construction phase. This safety planning process heavily relies on safety managers’ risk perception capabilities. These capabiliti...

Virtual reality (VR)-based approaches have been used to facilitate safety knowledge transfer and increase hazard awareness by providing safe and controlled experiences of unsafe scenarios for construction safety training applications. However, high computational costs, long development times, and the limited sense of presence and realism associated...

Improving the hazard-identification skills of construction workers is a vital step towards preventing accidents in the increasingly complex working conditions of construction jobsites. Training the construction workforce to recognize hazards therefore plays a central role in preparing workers to actively understand safety-related risks and make ass...

Purpose: Over the past decade, researchers have used unmanned aerial systems (UASs) in construction industry for various applications from site inspection to safety monitoring or building maintenance. This paper aims to assort academic studies on construction UAS applications, summarize logics behind using UAS in each application and extend unders...

Construction is one of the leading industries in terms of workplace accidents. Safety training provides workers and professionals with tools to actively prevent these accidents. However, previous research has highlighted deficiencies in current safety training methods. Virtual Reality (VR) and Augmented Reality (AR) technologies have been employed...

Unmanned aerial vehicles (UAV) have gained tremendous interest in the construction management domain as a platform for progress monitoring, safety supervision, quality inspections, and overall job site logistics. With the continued growth of UAV application within construction domain, it is essential for construction program graduates to develop a...

While the technology and tools used to design and present structural elements in building construction have advanced, construction drawings are still mainly two-dimensional (2D). Paper-based floor plans often reference other drawings to deliver design intent to construction site crews. This process sometimes results in poor design communication, si...