CLAREMONT — ORIGIN 21 EDITIONS
2006 → 2026
DESRIST.
Design Science Research in Information Systems & Technology
For two decades, DESRIST has been the gathering place for the design science research community — the researchers and practitioners who build, evaluate, and theorize the artifacts that move information systems forward. Twenty-one editions, four continents, one enduring question: how do we design things that are at once rigorous and useful?
Münster, Germany
A conference that travels the world.
Each summer, a different institution on a different continent hosts DESRIST — from Claremont and St. Gallen to Chennai, Pretoria, Montego Bay, and Münster. What stays constant is the community and the method: building artifacts that matter, and studying how we build them.
The home of design science research.
DESRIST is the premier international venue dedicated to design science research (DSR) in information systems and technology — a place where rigor meets relevance.
01 What DESRIST is
An annual, international conference that brings together researchers and practitioners engaged in every aspect of design science research. Scholars from information systems, computer science, software engineering, human–computer interaction, healthcare and medical informatics, and beyond convene to present and debate new artifacts, methods, and theories. The program spans full and short papers, prototypes and demonstrations, panels and workshops, and a doctoral consortium for emerging researchers.
02 What design science research is
Design science research is the paradigm of creating and rigorously evaluating innovative artifacts — constructs, models, methods, and instantiations — that solve real problems while contributing to knowledge. Rooted in Herbert Simon's The Sciences of the Artificial and advanced through decades of IS scholarship, DSR holds two commitments in tension: relevance to practice and rigor in method.
03 The proceedings
Since its earliest editions, DESRIST has published its proceedings in Springer's Lecture Notes in Computer Science (LNCS) series, giving the community a durable, citable record of the field's progress. Each year's accepted papers are indexed and archived, year over year.
04 The community
More than a conference, DESRIST is a community of practice. Its single-stream spirit, doctoral consortium, and rotating international hosts have made it a welcoming home for early-career and established researchers alike — and a launching point for many of the methods that now define DSR.
From a Claremont gathering to a global series.
In 2005, Prof. Samir Chatterjee had a crazy idea to create a forum where Design Science Researchers can gather and share their work. So he called up Prof. Alan Hevner of USF and discussed this idea. They both agreed that there is enough interest in DSR and hence in 2006 the first conference was launched. DESRIST began in February 2006 at Claremont Graduate University, convened to give design science research a dedicated home of its own. What started as a focused American gathering of a still-emerging research paradigm grew, year by year, into one of the most respected international conference series in information systems.
The early editions stayed close to home — Claremont, Pasadena, Atlanta, Philadelphia — building momentum and a community. In 2010, the conference crossed the Atlantic to St. Gallen, Switzerland, marking its arrival as a truly global series. From there it kept reaching outward: Chennai in 2018 brought DESRIST to Asia for the first time; Pretoria in 2023 to Africa; and Montego Bay in 2025 to the Caribbean.
Across twenty-one editions, the constants have been the method and the people — a community committed to building artifacts that are both rigorous and useful, and to studying the act of design itself. In June 2026, the series reaches its 21st edition in Münster, Germany, under the theme “Designing for Better Futures.”
The first International Conference on Design Science Research in Information Systems and Technology is held at Claremont Graduate University, giving DSR a venue of its own.
DESRIST is held outside the United States for the first time, under the banner “Global Perspectives on Design Science Research.”
The series reaches Asia, themed “Designing for a Digital and Globalized World.”
DESRIST convenes on the African continent for the first time, exploring Society 5.0.
Two decades of DESRIST, and its first edition in the Caribbean: “Local Solutions for Global Challenges.”
The 21st edition returns to Europe, hosted by the University of Münster: “Designing for Better Futures.”
Twenty-one editions.
Every DESRIST conference, from the founding in Claremont to Münster 2026 — a record of where the design science research community has gathered.
Every call, every year.
The themes, tracks, and deadlines that shaped each edition — a working archive of the calls that brought the community together.
The DESRIST Lifetime Achievement Award.
Recognizing scholars whose sustained, distinguished work has shaped the field of design science research and the community that gathers around it.
The people who started it.
DESRIST was founded to give design science research a conference of its own — and has been carried forward by a rotating community of hosts and chairs ever since.
Samir Chatterjee
Founding Program Chair of the first DESRIST conferences (2006, 2007) and co-author, with Alan Hevner, of Design Research in Information Systems: Theory and Practice. A long-standing steward of the conference and the broader design science research community.
Alan R. Hevner
Co-founder of the DESRIST series and a foundational voice in design science research, whose work on the rigor–relevance balance and the design science research framework has shaped the field's methodology.
The proceedings.
DESRIST papers are published in Springer's Lecture Notes in Computer Science series — a permanent, citable archive of the field's progress.
↗ Recent volumes
- 2025 Local Solutions for Global Challenges — LNCS 15703 / 15704 (Montego Bay)
- 2024 Design Science Research for a Resilient Future (Trollhättan)
- 2023 Design Science Research for a New Society: Society 5.0 (Pretoria)
- 2022 The Transdisciplinary Reach of Design Science Research (St. Petersburg)
- 2013 Design Science at the Intersection of Physical and Virtual Design (Helsinki)
# Find & cite
The full DESRIST series is indexed by Springer and catalogued on dblp. From there you can browse every edition's table of contents and locate individual papers.
Join the community.
Whether you want to attend, submit, or host a future edition, DESRIST welcomes you into the design science research community.
→ Host a future edition
DESRIST is hosted by a different institution each year. If your university or research center would like to bring the conference to your community, the steering committee would be glad to hear from you.
@ Stay connected
Add your contact channels here — the steering committee email, a mailing list, and social accounts. I'll wire these up as soon as you give me the details.