XR in the Era of COVID-19 Pandemic

The COVID-19 pandemic forced many countries worldwide to take restrictive measures from shutting borders and canceling public gatherings, to controlling citizens’ movement and in many cases closing down big parts of the business and academic sector. These isolation measures rapidly changed human behavior in regards to conducting business, attending events and meetings, communicating, socializing and even entertaining themselves.

Subsequently, self-isolating individuals and groups explored new technologies and methods to accommodate their needs. Innovative technologies as Virtual, Augmented and Mixed Reality (VR/AR/MR) or as unified referred eXtended Reality (XR) have reportedly been utilized to assist this change. Virtual conferences, workspaces and meeting rooms have been increasingly populated during this period. There, participants with the use of avatars gather to conduct business, research and socialize. Additionally, MR solutions assisted remote cooperation and minimized physical human interaction in areas like training, education, manufacturing, rehabilitation and healthcare services. Whereas, virtual social meeting spaces have seen an upsurge in avatar creation and users interaction.

The aim of this special issue is to present high quality, original papers exposing eXtended Reality (XR) use cases, established and innovative solutions and research, attributed to this global phenomenon.

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