Individualization of a mathematical manikin model in terms of gender, age and morphological issues for predicting thermal comfort: a preliminary study

To holistically understand the influence of inhomo-geneous and dynamic indoor climatic effects on hu-man thermal comfort, it is essential to investigate the appropriate dynamic human thermoregulatory pro-cesses and their complex interdependencies within the body. Although gender and age specific differ-ences in thermal comfort perception are well known, the numerous mathematical model approaches pro-posed in literature, typically consider a standard human being of male gender. The research approach of this paper therefore focuses on the adaptation and parameterization of the physiological part of a virtual human thermoregulatory system to be able to repre-sent different morphological groups of humans. The aim is to improve the model’s prediction accuracy towards local and global indoor thermal comfort. In this regard, the use of detailed simulation models can support the invention of control strategies for energy saving and cost effective buildings, which is im-portant to keep up with the turnaround in energy policy, while coping with today’s constantly growing energy demands.