Carlos Hillinger - Introduction

Carlos Hillinger
Drexel University

I am a Junior student at Drexel University currently enrolled in the Dual Degree Program of the Engineering School, specifically in the Civil and Architectural Engineering Program. I am focusing my studies in Digital Building, which is the obvious reason for choosing AE-410 (Intelligent Buildings) as the first professional elective of my career.

I have been interested in construction all my life, thanks to the fact that you are working on something that you can physically see growing in front of you. It is clear to me how technology is transforming every industry, from Amazon changing the way people shop, to computers changing the way we do everything (learn, read, teach, etc.). In my opinion, technology will end up also shaping up the construction industry in well-developed countries.

I believe that coming from an undeveloped country, I can clearly see the advantages of using technology in the construction industry, which is why I am so interested in learning how to use intelligent system to improve the way we build, reducing costs and risk while increasing the quality of the end product. It is also of my interest to see how we can implement building technologies on undeveloped countries to improve quality of life in them.

I expect this class to give me the tools and knowledge to better understand how to use software tools and intelligent systems in the construction industry, and other applications that we might discover along the way.

I found interesting the Evernote post on "The Year in Robots". It is a very clear example on how intelligent systems are shaping our every day lives. It is one of my interested to find out how we can use robots not only to improve lives that are already fine, but to improve lives that do need to be improved.

I would define Intelligent Building as a concept used to describe the variety of systems and robots used to improve construction and reduce its costs. By improving construction I mean improving the quality of the buildings and reducing the time to build.