Swinal SAMANT (Dr)

Swinal Samant is an academic and an expert in sustainability, with over 25 years of global experience spanning the UK, India, and Singapore. Currently, she is a Visiting Associate Professor at the National University of Singapore (NUS). Her previous roles include Associate Professor at the University of Nottingham (UK); Co-Program Director of the MSc in Integrated Sustainable Design at NUS, as well as Head of the Building Modelling and Simulation Team at the Energy Research Institute, Nanyang Technological University (ERIAN, NTU), Singapore.

Her research and teaching focuses on environmental sustainability, carbon neutrality, and sustainable urbanism, particularly within high-density urban environments. She advocates for systems thinking, regenerative design, and circularity in the built environment. More specifically, she examines the implications of eliminating carbon emissions, on architectural form, typologies, materiality and systems selection\integration. Swinal’s research on vertical urban spaces in high-density Asian cities emphasises the integration of public spaces and multi-modal mobility systems, 3D planning and hybridity for developing innovative urban solutions that are both, sustainable and human-centric.

In addition to several publications in peer-reviewed journals, Swinal is the author of “Weaving Webs: Empowering and Humane” and co-author of “Form Intelligence: Reimagining the Industrial Landscape for a Circular Economy.” She has been an invited speaker, panel chair, PhD external examiner, design critic and juror for international design competitions and research bids, and an editorial board member/reviewer for international journals and conferences. She is actively involved with the Council on Tall Buildings and Urban Habitat (CTBUH) in various capacities for over a decade.