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What is at the Root of Construction 4.0: A Systematic Review of the Recent Research Effort

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Abstract

The last decades have seen considerable effort invested in a digital transition in the construction industry. While the building information modeling (BIM) approach plays an important role in such a transition, more and more technological approaches are emerging and grouped together under the concept of Construction 4.0. However, the contours of Construction 4.0 as a scientific domain are far from being clearly defined. A few literature reviews have been published in an attempt to clarify its meaning and define its enabling technologies, but do not provide a complete view of the research efforts. To fully understand the research effort, it is necessary to study the different communities and clusters, their weights and their interrelationships. This paper proposes a mapping of the Construction 4.0 research themes and clusters over 10 years of scientific publications, using a systematic literature review approach. 2444 papers published in peer-reviewed journals between 2010 and 2019 were identified and the associated keywords were analyzed in order to highlight their co-occurrences. The research shows how BIM plays a central role in the digital transformation, hiding a forest of emerging technologies represented by the main clusters identified. Of the 10 main enabling technologies in 2018, only three were already mentioned in 2010. Some of these technologies (Internet of Things, additive manufacturing, 3D printing and Big Data) seem to be in the position to occupy an increasingly important place in the coming years. It seems more difficult for other technologies (e.g., cyber physical systems) to find an important place, due to a lack of awareness in the industry. Others seem less and less addressed, for contrary reasons.

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Funding

This study was funded by the Mitacs Globalink program (Project ID 17861).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. École de technologie supérieure, 1100 Notre-Dame Street West, Montreal, QC, H3C 1K3, Canada

    Conrad Boton, Louis Rivest, Oussama Ghnaya & Moataz Chouchen

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  1. Conrad Boton
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  3. Oussama Ghnaya
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  4. Moataz Chouchen
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Correspondence to Conrad Boton.

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Boton, C., Rivest, L., Ghnaya, O. et al. What is at the Root of Construction 4.0: A Systematic Review of the Recent Research Effort. Arch Computat Methods Eng 28, 2331–2350 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11831-020-09457-7

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