Honors Seminar student projects

“Human-Computer Interaction in the Age of Extended Reality & Metaverse” student projects

Spring. 2024.  UC

Under the guidance of Ming Tang, Director of the XR-Lab at Digital Futures and DAAP, UC, this honors seminar course has propelled students through an immersive journey into the realm of XR. The course encompasses Extended Reality, Metaverse, and Digital Twin technologies, providing a comprehensive platform for theoretical exploration and practical application in XR development.

The coursework showcases an array of student-led research projects that investigate the role of XR in various domains, including medical training, flight simulation, entertainment, tourism, cultural awareness, fitness, and music. Through these projects, students have had the opportunity to not only grasp the intricate theories underpinning future HCI developments but also to apply their skills in creating immersive experiences that hint at the future of human-technology interaction.

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Digital Twin of Cincinnati

A realtime flythrough demo for Digital Twin of City Cincinnati

Digital Futures Building at the University of Cincinnati

Destroy Alien buildings near the UC campus. Project developed by students Cooper Pflaum and Nishanth Chidambaram. 

P&G Metaverse

Title: Leveraging Metaverse Platforms for Enhanced Global Professional Networking – Phase 1

Ming Tang, Principal Investigator

Amount: $32,416

Funding: P&G Digital Accelerator.

Gotal: Metaverse technologies for global engagement. Human-Computer Interaction, Digital Human. Immersive visualization. 

  • P&G Team. : Elsie Urdaneta, Sam Azeba. Paula Saldarriaga, JinnyLe HongOanh
  • UC Team: Ming Tang, Students: Nathaniel Brunner, Ahmad Alrefai, Sid Urankar

In Phase 1 of the “Leveraging Metaverse Platforms for Enhanced Global Professional Networking” project, conducted in partnership with P&G, the XR-Lab proposes a pilot study aimed at identifying and analyzing the top five metaverse platforms best suited for professional networking and conferencing.  The metaverse has opened unprecedented opportunities for communication, collaboration, and social engagement, offering innovative solutions for professional networking and conferencing. In Phase 1, “Surveying the Current Metaverse Landscape,” the UC team examined the top five metaverse platforms to evaluate their potential for replicating global in-person professional networking experiences and supporting multi-user online conferences.

This phase provided a systematic assessment of the leading platforms suitable for professional networking and conferencing. The team analyzed how these platforms leverage emerging technologies to create immersive experiences, such as hosting online conferences and facilitating discussions with global experts. The Phase 1 final report delivered a comprehensive evaluation of the strengths and limitations of each platform, along with recommendations for platform selection based on specific criteria such as audience size, interactivity, and technical requirements.

Additionally, the UC team demonstrated how platforms such as Mesh and Hyperspace can be customized for specific events, including tailored branding and interactive features designed to enhance professional networking and conferencing. These demonstrations provide valuable insights for P&G, highlighting how metaverse technologies can be strategically developed and adopted to expand global engagement and enable innovative event experiences.

Customized Metaverse Demo developed by the UC Team.

Please reach out to the P&G Team for the final report. 


Related Links:

Fluid Sim in VR

Fluid Simulation in Virtual Reality. Unreal Engine. Collision test with hand. 

Digital Twin, LLM & IIOT

IIOT for legacy and intelligent factory machines with XR and LLM feedback with a Digital Twin demonstration of real-time IOT for architecture/building applications using Omniverse. 

  • PIs: Sam Anand, Ming Tang.
  • Students: Anuj Gautama, Mikhail Nikolaenko, Ahmad Alrefai, Aayush Kumar, Manish Raj Aryal,c, Eian Bennett, Sourabh Deshpande 

$40,000. UC Industry 4.0/5.0 Institute Consortium Research Project: 01.2024-01.2025

The project centers on the development of a Digital Twin (DT) and a multi-agent Large Language Model (LLM) framework designed to access and interpret real-time and historical data through an Industrial Internet of Things (IIoT) platform. Real-time data is sourced from legacy machines and smart machines, integrating Building Information Modeling (BIM) with environmental sensors. The multi-agent LLM framework comprises specialized agents and supports diverse user interfaces, including screen-based systems, Virtual Reality (VR) environments, and mobile devices, enabling versatile interaction, data visualization, and analysis.

The research evaluates leading DT platforms—Autodesk Tandem, NVIDIA Omniverse, and Unreal Engine—focusing on their capabilities to integrate IoT and BIM data while supporting legacy machine systems.  Autodesk Tandem excelled in seamlessly combining BIM metadata with real-time IoT streams for building operations and system scalability.  NVIDIA Omniverse demonstrated unmatched rendering fidelity and collaborative features through its Universal Scene Description (USD) framework. Unreal Engine, notable for its immersive visualization, proved superior for LLM integration, leveraging 3D avatars and conversational AI to enhance user interaction.

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