Multisensory immersive media and next-generation applications

沉浸式通信旨在以模糊真实和虚拟环境之间界限的方式，实现与远程人员和环境的自然体验和互动。今天，我们需要更有效的方式与远方的人沟通，这是前所未有的。然而，现有的沉浸式技术和应用仅依赖于两种感官：视觉和听觉。为了实现真正的沉浸式交流，我们需要涉及其他感官，如嗅觉、触觉和热感知。想象一下，你正在看一部电影，你感受到爆炸的热量；在电子游戏中，你可以在开车时感受到风吹过你的脸；你可以闻到食物的电视广告；焦虑患者的多感官虚拟治疗或者是视频会议，你可以“触摸”电话另一端的人。事实上，爱立信的消费者实验室认为，到2030年，即将到来的技术进步将把我们从一个以屏幕为基础的世界带到一个以感官为基础的世界。预计物联网将成为感官互联网，在新兴的5G网络和触觉互联网创新的帮助下，思维、触觉、嗅觉、味觉、视觉和声音将融合在一起。

Immersive communication aims to enable natural experiences and interactions with remote people and environments in ways that blur the line between real and virtual environments. Today, our need for more effective ways to communicate with remote people has never been greater. Existing immersive technologies and applications, however, rely only on two senses: vision and hearing. To enable true immersive communications, we need to involve other senses, such as olfaction, touch, and thermo(re)ception. Imagine yourself watching a movie where you feel the heat from an explosion; a videogame where you can feel the wind in your face as you are driving; TV ads where you can smell the food; multisensory virtual therapy for individuals with anxiety; or a videoconference, where you can "touch" the person on the other side of the call. In fact, Ericsson's ConsumerLab suggests that upcoming technological advances will move us from a screen-based world to a sense-based world by 2030. It is envisioned that the Internet of Things will become the Internet of Senses where mind, touch, smells, taste, sight and sound will all come together with the help of emerging 5G networks and Tactile Internet innovations. Canada, despite being known worldwide for innovations in virtual reality (VR), falls far behind Europe, for example, when it comes to multisensory immersive media research. This proposal aims to fill this gap. We request funds to purchase a multisensory immersive virtual reality booth - the first in Canada for research purposes. It is portable, wheelchair accessible, and comprises a programmable interface in which scents, hot/cold air, arm gestures, haptic feedback, immersive audio, and VR content can be presented for research purposes. This fundamental component will enable a new line of research in Canada, that of multisensory immersive media. When coupled with our award-winning instrumented virtual reality headset and user-aware human factor metrics for quality-of-experience monitoring, applications across multiple verticals will be developed that are optimized for each user. Within the healthcare sector, applications such as multisensory anxiety therapeutics and Alzheimer's disease diagnosis will be explored. For defense, it will enable next-generation training of soldiers and pilots in high-risk situations. For the entertainment sector, new paradigms in gaming, gamer experience, and remote tourism will be enabled. The requested equipment will not only open up a new research frontier for Canada, but will also expose existing and incoming highly qualified personnel to a highly interdisciplinary topic, thus providing young researchers with invaluable cross-disciplinary expertise in domains that are highly sought-after in the marketplace. Represenatative examples include human factors, immersive media, signal processing, serious gaming, neuropsychology, healthcare 4.0, information fusion, big data, and machine learning, to name a few.