Research Internship, Sustainable Architecture

Autodesk

1d

About The Position

As part of Autodesk’s team, this internship role may have the opportunity to contribute to project(s) supporting Autodesk’s partnership as the Official Design and Make Platform of the LA28 Olympic and Paralympic Games and Team USA. Position Overview Autodesk Research is seeking a graduate-level research intern with a background in architecture and computation—including M.Arch students with strong CS skills—to contribute to the development and evaluation of AI-enabled and computational workflows for early-stage building design on a real-world building project. This role supports research and prototyping efforts across space planning, structural and material reuse optimization, and embodied carbon assessment. You will work closely with research and product partners to help ensure AI systems frame design problems appropriately, integrate data responsibly, and produce outputs that are useful, interpretable, and aligned with architectural practice.

Requirements

• Enrolled in (or recently completed) a Master’s or PhD program, such as: M.Arch with a strong computational or CS focus SMArchS, Building Technology, or related programs
• Strong background in data analysis, scripting, or computational modeling
• Experience working with structured and semi-structured datasets, metrics, or optimization problems
• Coursework or research experience related to sustainability, embodied carbon, materials, building systems, or space planning
• Comfortable collaborating and communicating across architecture, engineering, and software teams

Nice To Haves

• Experience with LCA, carbon accounting, or environmental datasets
• Exposure to AI-assisted workflows, optimization methods, or decision-support systems
• Interest in applied research and translating academic methods into scalable tools
• Experience with these tools are helpful, not required Computational Design: Grasshopper, Rhino, Dynamo
• Programming: Cursor, Python, JavaScript, C#, or similar
• Data & Analysis: Pandas, NumPy, Jupyter
• AI / ML: Applied ML workflows, LLMs, or AI-assisted design tools
• Sustainability & Building Data: EPD databases, carbon tools, LCA software

Responsibilities

• Evaluate AI-driven workflows supporting early-stage architectural design, including space and structural optimization and layout-driven analysis
• Assess how design problems related to space planning, structure, materials, reuse, and carbon performance are formulated
• Review and analyze the use of environmental, material, and building datasets (e.g., EPDs, carbon databases, space metrics)
• Advise on improvements to computational logic, assumptions, reasoning transparency, and workflow robustness
• Compare AI-generated outputs with academic research methods, parametric workflows, or in-house tools
• Contribute research insights and recommendations that improve scientific rigor, usability, and design relevance
• Test prototypes of multi-agent AI workflows that assess trade-offs among carbon footprint, cost, reuse, and schedule across different venue designs. Some of this work may support Autodesk's ongoing work as the Design & Make Platform of the LA28 Games with the LA28 Games
• Research emerging construction and deconstruction methods, including digital material passports and workflows for design for disassembly and recovery. Some of this work may support Autodesk's ongoing work as the Design & Make Platform of the LA28 Games with the LA28 Games

What This Job Offers

• Career Level: Intern