Find a PhD supervisor in Design
Design academic staff have a wealth of experience and expertise in their research.
Dr Diana Albarrán González
Dr Gabriela Baron
Gabriela is a lecturer at the Design Programme. Her supervisory and research expertise is in the field of strategic design for environmental sustainability, environmental conservation and social innovation.
Areas of research
- Design for environmental conservation
- Design for resilient, circular and regenerative human-environment systems
- Sustainable transportation and accessibility in the urban environment
- Methodologies for impact planning and assessment
Recent projects/research
- Design for Conservation: Co-Development of design toolkit to facilitate strategic innovation in environmental conservation projects
- Valuing the Arts in Australia and Aotearoa New Zealand
- Public Transport accessibility model according to the user experience of the urban context
- www.gabrielabaron.com
Contact Gabriela
Dr Angus Campbell
Angus Donald Campbell is the Head of the Design Programme. His university lecturing, practice-based research and freelance design experience is passionately focused on local and sustainable innovation at the complex nexus of social, technological and ecological systems. For more information please visit: angusdonaldcampbell.com
Areas of research
- Practice-based design research with specific focus on sustainable innovation to regenerate complex social, technical and ecological systems.
- Pluriversal design with interest in Development, the Global South, inequality, indigenous knowledge and decolonisation.
- Local futures, including appropriate technology, circular economies, and food systems.
- Socio-technical innovation for industrial design.
Recent projects/research
- Unequal stories: Researching gender inequality in design disciplines. A collaborative research project funded by the Global Challenges Research Fund and Research England with the University of Falmouth (UK) and the University of Johannesburg (SA) | 2018 - ongoing | Co-investigator
- Designing development: An exploration of technology innovation by small-scale urban farmers in Johannesburg. Doctorate of Literature and Philosophy in Development Studies at the University of Johannesburg | 2012 - 2020.
- Design Society Development (DSD) Design for Social Innovation and Sustainability
(DESIS) Lab. Collaborative design research lab based in the Faculty of Art, Design and
Architecture, University of Johannesburg | 2012 - 2020 | Co-founder & Coordinator. - iZindaba-Zokudla (Conversations about Food): Innovation in the Soweto Food System. Multistakeholder research project at the University of Johannesburg | 2012 - 2020 |
Co-researcher. - Researching Alternative Urban Methods. ERASMUS funded collaborative research
exchange with Sheffield School of Architecture (UK), SEPT (IN), Nanjing University (CH) and DSD DESIS Lab (SA) | 2017 - 2019 | Coresearcher. - Achieving Inclusive Cities through Scaling up Participatory Planning in Africa. Leverhulme Trust funded collaborative research project with the Global Development Institute, Manchester University & DSD DESIS Lab (UJ) | 2017 - 2020 | Research sub-contractor
Contact Angus
Dr Allan Fowler
Allan is a senior lecturer in Design. Allan’s research interests are in game development, and understanding the user experience. He has also undertaken considerable work in increasing the representation of minorities in STEM.
Areas of research
- Game Design & Development
- Augmented and Virtual Reality
- User Experience
- Human Computer Interaction
- Increasing underrepresented minorities participation in STEM
- Game jams & hackathons for teaching and learning
Recent projects/research
- A Fowler, K Nesbitt and A Canossa, Identifying Cognitive Load in a Computer Game: An exploratory study of young children, 2019 IEEE Conference on Games (CoG), London, United Kingdom, 2019, pp. 1-6, doi: 10.1109/CIG.2019.8848064
- A Fowler (2016, March). Informal stem learning in game jams, hackathons and game creation events. In Proceedings of the International Conference on Game Jams, Hackathons, and Game Creation Events (pp. 38-41)
- A Fowler and I Schreiber (2017, February). Engaging under-represented minorities in STEM through game jams. In Proceedings of the second International Conference on Game Jams, Hackathons, and Game Creation Events (pp. 1-5)