Ana Cristina Fachinelli is a researcher and professor at the Universidade de Caxias do Sul (UCS, Brazil), where she leads the CityLivingLab—an applied research environment focused on knowledge-based innovation, sustainability, and citizen engagement. Her work bridges management, urban studies, and science-and-technology studies, exploring how data-informed approaches and living labs can support better decision-making in cities and organizations. She has coordinated and collaborated on projects involving IoT sensing for urban and peri-urban environments, resilience and sustainability indicators (ISO frameworks), and citizen science methodologies to improve public services and urban quality of life. Ana’s publications include articles and book chapters on knowledge-based development, smart and sustainable cities, urban mobility, and innovation in public services, with international collaborations spanning Italy, the United Kingdom, Mexico, and other partners. She advises master’s and doctoral research on topics such as metropolitan mobility, AI applications in health, and metrics for sustainability and creative economies. In addition to academic leadership roles, she actively develops partnerships with municipalities, NGOs, and industry to translate research into scalable social impact.
