Merhan Shahda

Port Said University · Architectural Engineering and Urban Planning Department

Biophilic design (BD) is defined as a design approach that promotes human-nature connectedness (HNC) in the built environment (BE), resulting in a significant impact on human health, well-being, and productivity, in addition to several economic, social, and environmental benefits. This study presents a critical analysis of the most important propos...

Because the construction sector exerts a considerable environmental effect, especially building materials, a growing interest in environmental design and construction has emerged. The United Nations has set sustainable development goals (SDGs) for 2030 to protect the environment, including energy conservation and doubling the global rate of improvi...

Diverse heritage architecture characterizes Port Said in Egypt, reflecting European and Arab influences. Suez Canal heritage villas comprise 25% of the total listed heritage buildings in the city. Thus, it is important to retrofit them, aligning with the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). By reviewing the previous literature related to the green...

Green concepts and Building Information Modeling (BIM) are increasingly adopted in construction processes, including new and heritage buildings, to achieve Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and create accurate digital models for observation, analysis, and optimization. However, BIM adoption faces challenges including a lack of regulations, refus...

This study enhances designers' ability to decode natural geometric patterns, simplify their descriptions, and apply them to the built environment using Voronoi diagram (VD). Therefore, VDs are examined using a literature review, establishing the D 4 G classification of VDs, which consists of five acronyms: dimension, domain, distribution, dominance...

Buildings contribute 40–50% of the total energy consumption around the world. Therefore, vital and decisive measures need to be taken to reduce this consumption. One of the most important of these measures is passive design. The passive design has recently received increasing attention as an option to reduce energy consumption and reduce carbon emi...

Energy efficiency and the reduction of carbon emissions have become the main climate goals for newly constructed or existing buildings. In the building sector, curtain walls (CWs) account for the majority of unwanted solar heat gain and consume most of the energy used. In this context, adaptive technologies (ATs) offer a wide range of alternative s...

Recently, digital fabrication techniques have captured the attention of many architects and makers due to their ability to challenge traditional construction techniques and complex forms that were hard to apply in the past. Digital fabrication has bridged the gap between the architectural design and construction processes by creating a direct digit...

Natural ventilation has been one of the most important passive cooling strategies for conditioning the built environment. However, several challenges influence natural ventilation in multi-story buildings. Consequently, skycourt presents a passive cooling strategy to provide a direct airflow into the space to cool the surroundings, increase thermal...

Purpose Passive design strategies contribute to improving indoor comfort conditions and reducing buildings' energy consumption. For several years, courtyards have received wide attention from researchers because of their significant role in reducing energy demand. However, the abundance of multi-story buildings and the courtyards' incompatibility w...

Conservation of heritage buildings presents a significant approach to cultural identity and continuity. In this regard, previous literature has focused on architectural heritage. However, limited studies have been conducted to investigate the sustainable conservation hierarchy. Given the potential integration of Sustainable Development Goal require...

Can skyscrapers survive after COVID-19? Can the idea of integrating vertical farming (VF) into vertical architecture support the environmental, economic, and social issues in the post-pandemic era? Answering these questions is the main objective of this study. Therefore, it explores a) the impact of the pandemic on the built environment, especially...

The Arab Region embraces a diverse and substantial architectural heritage, with distinctive vocabularies and treatments, that has been as a source of inspiration for architects. However, the contemporary Arab architectural production is not at the desired level. So, the study questions the reasons for the success of Traditional Architecture in prov...

The self-shading of the walls reduces the temperature of the surface exposed to direct sunlight, thereby reducing the amount of heat transmitted through them. This feature presents a solution rendered by nature to reduce temperature in hot areas, the fact that inspires the possibility of reducing building temperature and thus reducing energy consum...

Egypt is divided into seven regional units; each region includes a number of governorates that are connected geographically and economically. When the Green Pyramid Rating System (GPRS) was proposed, and the weightings of its categories were set, the wide variation of the potential and the challenges of each region were not taken into account. Ther...

Many architecture students encounter the challenge of comprehending construction systems in a simplified way. Accordingly, this study aims to facilitate the understanding of architectural construction systems for architecture students by employing the Bio mimicry, where nature is the first inspiring teacher to create construction systems. In order...

The concept of recycling and reusing starts from the design stage and sustainably continues through the stages of construction, operation and maintenance, to create an architectural process in which the architect directs his efforts and creations to create architectural applications based on the reuse of construction and demolition waste. The desig...

The global energy demand has increased, which led to a severe shortage of energy sources in the world. Buildings consume alone about 40% of total energy production. This is mainly due to the lack of consideration of climatic and environmental factors in the early steps of building design. So we have many buildings with low thermal performance. In a...

The last decades have witnessed countless, progressive, rapid advances in the field of Building Technology, which has a strong impact on construction industry. Consequently, employing these techniques to support Sustainable Architecture has become a pivotal issue. Since architecture is a product of the available Technology Era, hence building techn...

As desert areas represent the most of the Arab countries lands, hence, these areas suffer from scarcity in the sources of water in addition to high temperatures. Furthermore, these areas encounter an increased demand for non-renewable energy resources, in order to achieve thermal comfort for individuals. Accordingly, this paper focuses on how Biomi...

The last decades have witnessed countless, progressive, rapid advances in the field of Building Technology, which has a strong impact on the construction industry. Consequently, employing these techniques to support Sustainable Architecture has become a pivotal issue. Since architecture is a product of the available Technology Era, hence building t...

The last decades have witnessed countless, progressive, and rapid advances in the field of building technology, which has a strong impact on the construction industry. Consequently, employing these techniques to support sustainable architecture has become a pivotal issue. Since architecture is a product of the available Technology Era, hence, build...

Certainly nature was and still the first teacher to humans and the main inspiration. Nature is a source of inspiration for architects as it is for scientists, for example: its consider source of inspiration for structures, building materials and systems of environmental and aesthetics. There aren't enough studies to conclude and devise solutions fr...

Through the study and analysis of the second level to Biomimicry, and try to exploit ways of the organism adapting with its environment, has been reached for the approaches. In this framework, research paper deals with an analysis for the main principles of environmental sustainability in the nature. Research proposed division environmental sustain...