Research

Who we are

The design.nexus research group of Ghent University Campus Kortrijk aims to build bridges between education, sustainability and industry in the field of technology-driven design and change processes of innovative product/service and consumption/production systems. The group implements interdisciplinary design strategies and practices together with industry and public and private sector organizations.

  • More about the team

What we do

design.for.empowerment

design.sustainability

The lens .sustainability is concerned with the negative consequences arising from industrial production and product design. It investigates and experiments with new ways to bring about a more sustainable future by engaging in various co-design activities.

design.industry

design.industry carries out multidisciplinary applied research on the design for new digital and/or bio-based processes, personalized, changing and scalable production systems

Research labs

Learning Lab

In our Learning Lab, we exchange knowledge on teaching and learning methods and offer training to industry and academic partners by implementing design-based methodologies, such as the Design Thinking methodology and game-based learning.

Learning-lab

Bio-Makerspace

The Bio-Makerspaceis a new creative space where students and companies learn to apply the basic principle of Design for a Circular Economy by making prototypes and experimenting with DIY, bio-based and circular materials.

Materialen

Computational Design & Fabrication Lab

In this lab, we explore and combine the latest digital design techniques with digital production techniques. We explore these digital techniques in order to identify opportunities for new designs.

Beeld computational design

Digital Design Tools Lab

In our Digital Design Tools lab, we investigate how to use existing digital tools such as Virtual Reality as efficiently as possible in the design process.

Virtual Reality

Product Design Lab for New Industrial Production (Industry 5.0)

In our Product Design Lab for new industrial production, we will look at how to design products and product systems so that they can be easily and efficiently produced in the manufacturing companies of today and tomorrow

industrie-beeld

Medical Product Design Lab

In our Medical Product Development lab, in addition to technical aspects, we also investigate the interactions with patients, doctors, nurses, etc. with the aim of designing the most optimal medical product system

Breastboard, an example of medical productdesign

Overview and additional information on these labs.

Research projects and doctoral research

VLAIO - TETRA

Designs for easy and intuitive manual assembly

INTERREG - Learning network bio-builders

Development of an innovative, practice-oriented educational method for the construction industry. 

Logo Interreg biobouwers

PROTOTYPING CIRCULAIR

Circular prototyping using bio-based and/or digital production.
Prototyping Circulair

T-CREPE / Erasmus +

Textile engineering for co-creation paradigms in education

Circular sprint / Crafth

Additive Manufacturing (AM) for a Circular Economy

Logo CrafthEIT-RawMaterials Logo

Interreg Transfirm

Promoting the development of cross-border activities of students with business plans

Logo Interreg

Bio-inspired orthopaedic braces

Researching solutions from nature that allow both rigidity and mobility and avoid the negative effects of total immobility.

Click here for a complete overview and additional information on these projects.

Ongoing PhD research

Click here for a complete overview and additional information on our PhD research.

Publications

An overview of our latest publications