Special Issue (26-03-01): Computational Intelligence for Smart Cities, Energy Efficiency, and Sustainable Systems

Background

The increasing interconnection of urban systems has accelerated the integration of computational intelligence into modern city networks. Through the integration of deep analytics, autonomous governance and adaptive learning, cities are becoming responsive systems with the capacity to integrate technological progress with sustainable ecosystems. By integrating decision-making in the major sectors such as transportation management, energy efficiency, waste disposal and environmental monitoring for increased efficiency and resilience. With growing urbanization, cities are still facing the enduring issues of scalability, interoperability and real-time coordination of complex networks. These issues highlight the requirement for intelligent frameworks capable of decoding heterogeneous data, forecasting city trends and dynamically optimizing distributed functions. Technologies such as networked sensors, intelligent networks and adaptive algorithms are the foundation for predictive decision support and decentralized management to enable rapid and more sustainable urban responses. By combining automation, communication and cognition, computational intelligence helps municipal governments enhance public services, eliminates operating inefficiencies and encourage resource-aware development. Ultimately, it represents a transformative route toward cleaner, smarter and more resilient urban environments that align with the broader vision of sustainable digital governance and human-centered innovation.

Despite its expanding potential, computational intelligence within smart city systems continues to experience significant challenges. Protection of data, interoperability and the high computational expense of smart models tend to discourage efficient deployment and scalability. Most systems also suffer from a lack of transparency, such that policymakers and citizens cannot trust or understand automated decisions. Uneven technological preparedness and digital infrastructure further exacerbate the disparity in sustainable urban growth. To overcome these challenges, researchers ought to prioritize the development of explainable, lightweight and privacy-preserving models that promote accountability and equity. Interoperable frameworks for secure data sharing, adaptive algorithms that work well across different environments and energy-efficient computing systems that reduce resource tension should also be created with emphasis. By addressing these limitations, computational intelligence will evolve into a sustainable basis for future cities to spur innovation while securing equitable access, ethical governance and long-term environmental sustainability.

Aim

This special issue invites advance research, models and frameworks that examine the contribution of computational intelligence toward developing smart, sustainable urban ecosystems. It also invites contributions tackling data management challenges, interoperability, energy efficiency and system scalability in smart city environments. Researchers, technologists and policymakers are invited to submit advance solutions that exploit intelligent automation, adaptive learning and ethical AI to construct resilient, resource-conserving and human-centered cities that capture the principles of digital sustainability and urban innovation.

Scope

    • IoT-Driven Predictive Analytics for Sustainable Infrastructure Management
    • Federated Learning Models for Privacy-Preserving Smart City Data Integration
    • Fuzzy Logic-Based Decision Systems for Intelligent Waste Management
    • Hybrid Neural Networks for Environmental Monitoring and Pollution Forecasting
    • Blockchain-Enabled Energy Trading Platforms for Decentralized Smart Grids
    • Swarm Intelligence Algorithms for Autonomous Public Transport Coordination
    • Knowledge Graphs for Context-Aware Urban Governance and Policy Support
    • Multi-Agent Systems for Adaptive Water Distribution and Management
    • Bio-Inspired Optimization for Green Urban Infrastructure Design
    • Explainable AI Techniques for Transparent Smart City Decision-Making
    • Big Data Analytics for Urban Mobility Pattern Prediction and Planning
    • Self-Organizing Networks for Efficient Urban Communication Systems
    • Cognitive Computing Approaches for Sustainable Urban Policy Development

Important dates

• Paper Submission Deadline: 15.06.2026
• Notification to Author: 20.08.2026
• Revised Paper Submission: 10.10.2026
• Final Decision Announcement: 10.12.2026

Lead Associate Editor of this Special Issue:
Prof. Shang-Chih Lin 

Feng Chia University (FCU), Taiwan

Details of the Our Guest Editor Team:  

Lead Guest Editor

Dr. Marzieh Faridi Masouleh 

Ahrar Institute of Technology and Higher Education, Rasht, Iran.

Official Email: [email protected]

Expert Domains: Artificial Intelligence, Computational intelligence, Data Mining, Optimization, Neural Network.
 

Co-Guest Editors:

Dr. Dena Bazazian

University of Plymouth, PL4 8AA Plymouth, U.K.

Official Email: [email protected]

Expert Domains: Computer vision, deep learning, point clouds, image processing, pattern recognition.

Dr. Mehregan Mahdavi

Kingsford Institute of Higher Education (KIHE), Sydney NSW, Australia.

Official Email: [email protected]

Expert Domains: Recommender Systems, Big Data, Distributed Systems, Service Oriented Architecture

Aref Akbari Kashali

University of Yazd, Yazd Province, Iran.

Official Email: [email protected]

Expert Domains: Large Language Models, software architectures, anomaly detection, financial forecasting