Biography
I am a Master's student in the Department of Computer Science at Virginia Tech, graduating in December 2021. I want to pursue a career as a software development engineer. My research interests include: Virtual/Augmented/Mixed Reality, Internet-of-Things and Machine Learning
Research Focus: My area of research is in Embodiment and Collaboration within Mixed-Reality environments. My primary research project is called Nurse Aide. This project is a mixed-reality based training simulation for Nursing Students. The project combines the features of the Microsoft Kinect V2 and the Microsoft HoloLens to provide embodied interactions with virtual objects that are superimposed with the students' physical environment. Alongside this project, I am also working on developing an infrastructure around the Azure Kinect and the Microsoft HoloLens to facilitate tele-presence for remote collaboration.
Education
B.S. Computer Science
August 2014 - May 2018
M.S. Computer Science
August 2018 - Dec 2021
My Skills
What I Do
Unity
Designing Virtual Environments
Mixed-Reality
Tangible experiences
HCI
Developing applications with a focus on Usability
Publications
Publications
An Approach to Embodiment and Interactions with Digital Entities in Mixed-Reality Environments
M. Handosa, H. Schulze, D. Gracanin, M. Tucker and M. Manuel, "An Approach to Embodiment and Interactions with Digital Entities in Mixed-Reality Environments," 2018 IEEE Conference on Virtual Reality and 3D User Interfaces (VR), Reutlingen, 2018, pp. 569-570.
Extending Embodied Interactions in Mixed Reality Environments
Handosa, Mohamed & Schulze, Hendrik & Gračanin, Denis & Tucker, Matthew & Manuel, Mark. (2018). Extending Embodied Interactions in Mixed Reality Environments. 314-327. 10.1007/978-3-319-91581-4_23.
2021
Manuel, Mark & Dongre, Poorvesh & Alhamadani, Abdulaziz & Gračanin, Denis. (2021). Supporting Embodied and Remote Collaboration in Shared Virtual Environments. 639-652. 10.1007/978-3-030-77599-5_44
Re-imagining Indoor Space Utilization in the COVID-19 Pandemic with Smart Re-configurable Spaces (SReS)
Dongre, Poorvesh & Manuel, Mark & Gračanin, Denis. (2021). Re-imagining Indoor Space Utilization in the COVID-19 with Smart Re-configurable Spaces (SRes). 85-99. 10.1007/978-3-030-77015-0_7
Dasgupta, Archi & Williams, Samuel & Nelson, Gunnar & Manuel, Mark & Dasgupta, Shaoli & Gračanin, Denis. (2021). Redefining the Digital Paradigm for Virtual Museums. 357-373. 10.1007/978-3-030-77411-0_23
2020
Handosa, Mohamed & Dasgupta, Archi & Manuel, Mark & Gračanin, Denis. (2019).Rethinking User Interaction with Smart Environments - A Comparative Study of Four Interaction Modalities. 39-57. 10.1007/978-3-030-50344-4_4
Towards Real Time Object Recognition For Context Awareness in Mixed Reality: A Machine Learning Approach
A. Dasgupta, M. Manuel, R. S. Mansur, N. Nowak and D. Gračanin, "Towards Real Time Object Recognition For Context Awareness in Mixed Reality: A Machine Learning Approach," 2020 IEEE Conference on Virtual Reality and 3D User Interfaces Abstracts and Workshops (VRW), 2020, pp. 262-268, doi: 10.1109/VRW50115.2020.00054.
2019
Dasgupta, Archi & Handosa, Mohamed & Manuel, Mark & Gračanin, Denis. (2019). A User-centric Design Framework for Smart Built Environments. 124-143. 10.1007/978-3-030-21935-2_11
2018
Biologically Inspired Safety and Security for Smart Built Environments
Gracanin, Denis & D'Amico, Adam & Manuel, Mark & Carson, Walter & Eltoweissy, Mohamed & Cheng, Liang. (2018). Biologically Inspired Safety and Security for Smart Built Environments: Position Paper. 293-298. 10.1109/SPW.2018.00047.
An Approach to Embodiment and Interactions with Digital Entities in Mixed-Reality Environments
M. Handosa, H. Schulze, D. Gracanin, M. Tucker and M. Manuel, "An Approach to Embodiment and Interactions with Digital Entities in Mixed-Reality Environments," 2018 IEEE Conference on Virtual Reality and 3D User Interfaces (VR), Reutlingen, 2018, pp. 569-570.
Extending Embodied Interactions in Mixed Reality Environments
Handosa, Mohamed & Schulze, Hendrik & Gračanin, Denis & Tucker, Matthew & Manuel, Mark. (2018). Extending Embodied Interactions in Mixed Reality Environments. 314-327. 10.1007/978-3-319-91581-4_23.
Projects
Nurse Aide
Nurse Aide is a ongoing mixed-reality project that my research group (DVEL) is working on. The goal of Nurse Aide is to provide a realistic training simulation that teaches Nursing Students twenty-two different nursing skills that they have to demonstrate proficiency in, in order to obtain professional certification as Nurse Assistant. We determined that an embodied-learning experience within a mixed-reality environment would be an effective educational aid to supplement the existing nursing curriculum at our client school: The Washington County Career and Technical Education Center (WCCTEC) in Abingdon, Virginia. To this end, we developed an infrastructure that combined the features of the Microsoft HoloLens and the Microsoft Kinect V2 to provide students with "natural-seeming" interactions with virtual hospital environments, within the familiar setting of their classrooms.
Virginia Tech FutureHAUS
The Virginia Tech FutureHAUS is a multi-disciplinary project that combines innovations in architechture, computer science, engineering and urban design. These departments worked together to develop FutureHAUS, which will compete at the International Solar Decathlon Middle East in Novemeber 2018. FutureHAUS is a unique architectural production for several reasons, including: Its modular "cartridge-based" design, its solar-powered self-sustaining energy efficiency, and its robust IoT (Internet of Things) network of interconnected devices. My work on this project involved actuating several components in the house (doors, shelves, cabinets) and enabling them to be remotely operated from the several raspberry pi-powered touch displays around the house. I also worked on developing the control system for the movable walls in the FutureHAUS that allow for modifiable room spaces.
Mirror Worlds
Housed in the Virginia Tech Institute for Creativity, Arts and Technology (ICAT), Mirror Worlds is an NSF funded, interdisciplinary project focused on creating a computing infrastructure for research across physical and digital environments. Each environment within Mirror Worlds is a two part system composed of a physical room/building and a coexisting virtual model of that physical space. Users of an environment are not just visitors to a physical space or virtual model, but are also participants whose behavior influences the environments’ forms and functions. The virtual and physical aspects of the environment are connected with one another through a coordinate-based data networking system to enable user interaction with the rest of the system including environment objects and other users. My role in the Mirror Worlds project involved the testing and development of the Computer Vision system that tracked the physical location of ICAT visitors and placed their respective avatars at the corresponding virtual location in our digital model. This system enabled users to detect the anonymous presence and location of other visitors across the ICAT building.
Contact Information
Desk:
Department of Computer Science
Virginia Tech
2202 Kraft Drive
Blacksburg, Virginia 24060
Email: mmark95 AT vt DOT edu
Phone Number: (203) 809-7587