The engineering design community is confronting problems of unprecedented complexity and uncertainty. Climate change, autonomous systems, large-scale infrastructure needs, defense, security, and global health concerns are examples where traditional methods and approaches may not meet the needs of the problem. Extreme Design (XD) is emerging as a new research challenge that seeks to understand and advance design under such conditions (Marion et al., 2025). Extreme Design (XD) focuses on high-complexity, high-uncertainty challenges that extend beyond what is possible with conventional methodologies. XD emphasizes rapid iteration, interdisciplinary collaboration, and the development of adaptive processes, theories, and tools for problems that are hard to frame and resist conventional solution methods.
While significant progress has been made in computational design, design cognition, and collaborative systems, a gap remains in explicitly addressing design approaches suited for environments and problem spaces with extreme complexity and uncertainty dynamics. This special issue will gather research that defines, theorizes, and demonstrates methods and practices for XD, providing a foundation for a new research framework within engineering design.
Topics of Interest
We welcome original contributions that address and are centered on design problems, settings, methods, and approaches that exhibit one or more of the following characteristics:
- Ultra-high complexity and/or scale (e.g., autonomous networks and systems, global climate change)
- Exceptionally poorly defined problems and/or systems (e.g., biodiversity loss, designing remedies for all human diseases and conditions)
- Extremely large or sparse sets of data and/or stakeholders (e.g., managing massive virtual collaborations and interactions with participants and stakeholders, data from rare or anomalous occurrences, data from or engaging with extremely small populations)
- Extremely challenging requirements (multiple standard deviations from the norm) (e.g., designing machines that can operate for extremely long durations (i.e., operation for 100,000+ years)
- Extreme environmental conditions (e.g., space, very cold or warm environments, deep sea, exceptionally low-resourced)
- Extremely large populations (e.g., urban population centers, social media networks)
- Extremely high levels of iteration and experimentation (e.g., design autonomy, multi-scale prototyping, simulation of complex systems)
Special Issue Target Dates
- Submission Deadline: July 1, 2026
- Initial Review Completed By: September 15, 2026
- Final Decision By: December 1, 2026
- Publication: March 2027
Submission Instructions
Papers should be submitted electronically to the journal at journaltool.asme.org. At the Paper Submittal page, select the ASME Journal of Mechanical Design and then select the Special Issue: Extreme Design – Navigating High Complexity and High Uncertainty in Engineering Design.
Papers received after the submission deadline may still be considered if time and space permit. Early accepted papers will be published online first.
Guest Editors
- Eric Brubaker, Virginia Tech bru@vt.edu
- Madhurima Das, University of Melbourne das@unimelb.edu.au
- Kathryn Jablokow, Manhattan University kathryn.jablokow@manhattan.edu
- Tucker Marion, Northeastern University ` marion@northeastern.edu
- Tahira Reid Smith, Penn State tpr5404@psu.edu
- Maria Yang, MIT mcyang@mit.edu