Research Topics

Who worked on what: the people, projects and funding behind each ORCL research topic.

Each topic lists the ORCL projects, people and awards connected to it. The same tags appear on Who We Are, the project pages and the Funding page, so you can follow a topic across the site.

#E-Scooter · #Adolescent-Safety · #VR-Bike · #Pedestrian · #Design-Review · #Naturalistic-Driving · #Clinical-VR · #Cyber-Range · #AI-XR · #Smart-Buildings · #XR-Education

#E-Scooter

How people ride e-scooters on real streets and in VR: speed, gaze, road infrastructure, and real-time object detection on instrumented scooters.

Projects: E-Scooter Riders on the Street and in VR; Adolescent Micromobility Safety

People: Arman Hosseini, Zeyang Zheng, Leon Yacoubian and Amir Farzin Nikkhah, with Arsalan Heydarian, Brad Campbell and Omid Shoghli (UNC Charlotte). Alumni: Dong Chen and Arik Smith.

Funding: National Science Foundation, CPS-CIR: Enhancing Adolescent Micromobility Safety (2026–2030)

#Adolescent-Safety

Keeping teen e-scooter and bike riders safe by combining ubiquitous sensing, behavioral science and community engagement.

Projects: Adolescent Micromobility Safety

People: At UVA, Arsalan Heydarian (PI), Stefanie Sequeira, Brad Campbell, Donna Chen and Somayeh Asadi. At UNC Charlotte, Omid Shoghli, Aidong Lu and Lei Zhu.

Funding: National Science Foundation, CPS-CIR (2026–2030): awards 2553776 (UVA) and 2553777 (UNC Charlotte)

#VR-Bike

ORCL's VR bicycle simulator and the ORCLSim platform, used to measure how cyclists respond to street design, traffic and distraction.

Projects: VR Bicycle and Pedestrian Simulators (ORCLSim)

People: Donna Chen, Arsalan Heydarian and Brian Smith. Alumni: Xiang Guo, Erin Robartes and Austin Angulo.

Funding: Federal Highway Administration and Leidos, Development of a Virtual Reality Bicycle Simulator (2023–2024); UVA Engineering Research Innovation Award, Assessing Perceived Safety of Non-Motorized Travel with Virtual Reality (2018–2019)

#Pedestrian

Where pedestrians look and how they decide to cross, measured in VR and on real streets with eye tracking and physiological sensing.

Projects: Pedestrian Attention and Crossing Decisions; Seeing the City: Eye Tracking on a Downtown Street; VR Bicycle and Pedestrian Simulators (ORCLSim)

People: Donna Chen, Arsalan Heydarian, Andrew Mondschein and Brian Smith, with Arman Hosseini and Carreen de Cárdenas. Luca Cian (Darden School of Business) worked with Donna and Andrew on the 3Cavs study. Alumni: Afrida Raida, Austin Angulo, Xiang Guo and Erin Robartes.

Funding: UVA Engineering Research Innovation Award, Seeing the City: Understanding Pedestrian Gaze in Virtual Reality vs. Real World (2024–2025), investigators Donna Chen, Arsalan Heydarian and Andrew Mondschein; SMARTER Center, Measuring Pedestrian Psycho-Physiological Well-Being in the Built Environment (2024), investigators Donna Chen and Andrew Mondschein; UVA 3Cavaliers (3Cavs 2.0), Seeing the City: Measuring Engagement with the Public and Private Realms during Travel (2021–2023), investigators Andrew Mondschein, Luca Cian and Donna Chen; UVA Engineering Research Innovation Award, Assessing Perceived Safety of Non-Motorized Travel with Virtual Reality (2018–2019), investigators Donna Chen, Arsalan Heydarian, Leidy Klotz and Brian Smith

#Design-Review

VR models that let engineers, agencies and the public walk through proposed road designs before they are built.

Projects: VR for Design Review and Public Involvement

People: Donna Chen and Arsalan Heydarian, with Carreen de Cárdenas and Arman Hosseini.

Funding: Virginia Department of Transportation and Virginia Transportation Research Council, Virtual Reality as a Tool to Enhance Design Review and Public Involvement Processes (2024–2026)

#Naturalistic-Driving

Modeling driver stress, attention and state from wearables and in-vehicle sensing during everyday driving, as in the HARMONY study.

Projects: HARMONY: Driver State in Naturalistic Driving

People: Arsalan Heydarian. Alumni: Arash Tavakoli.

Support: UVA Link Lab and the Commonwealth Cyber Initiative

#Clinical-VR

Mixed-reality training for clinicians, with AI-driven virtual patients who deteriorate in real time and automated performance report cards.

Projects: VR Training for the Acutely Deteriorating Patient

People: Margaret K. Sande, Arsalan Heydarian, Kathryn Mutter, Somayeh Asadi and Homa Alemzadeh, with lab developer Junbo Zhao.

Funding: UVA Coulter Center for Translational Research (2025–2027); UVA School of Data Science Centrifuge Futures Grant, Building Intelligent Worlds (2026–2027)

#Cyber-Range

Immersive XR training that prepares Virginia's workforce to defend the operational technology behind critical infrastructure.

Projects: Immersive Cyber Range

People: Arsalan Heydarian (PI), Jon Goodall (co-PI) and Sepehr Sabeti (Leidos), with lab developer Junbo Zhao.

Funding: Commonwealth Cyber Initiative, Immersive Cyber Range for Workforce Readiness (2026–2027)

#AI-XR

AI-driven characters, avatars and virtual worlds for research and training in extended reality.

Projects: VR Training for the Acutely Deteriorating Patient; Immersive Cyber Range; XR Training for Traffic Signal Technicians

People: Zeyang Zheng and Xinyue Xu, with the Building Intelligent Worlds team: Arsalan Heydarian, Donna Chen, Devin Harris, Ryan W. Henry and Margaret K. Sande.

Funding: UVA School of Data Science Centrifuge Futures Grant, Building Intelligent Worlds (2026–2027); Commonwealth Cyber Initiative (2026–2027)

#Smart-Buildings

How sensing, controls and AI in buildings affect the people who use and manage them: indoor air, noise and distraction, privacy, inspection and code compliance.

Projects: Noise and Distraction in Workspaces

People: Arsalan Heydarian, Somayeh Asadi and Brad Campbell, with Saja Alnusair, Amir Farzin Nikkhah and Zeyang Zheng. Alumna: Beatrice Li.

Funding: National Science Foundation, FW-HTF-RL: Future of Digital Facility Management (2023–2027); National Science Foundation, NRT-IPP: Smart Construction, Infrastructure, and Buildings (SCIBER-CT) (2025–2030)

Papers: A longitudinal study of IAQ metrics and the efficacy of default HVAC ventilation (Building and Environment, 2024); A vision-language model agent for building code compliance (2025)