Chairs: Georgios Artopoulos (CyI) and Agiatis Benardou (DARIAH ERIC / ATHENA RC)

It is widely acknowledged that VR can create a more engaging experience, one that enables the visitor of a virtual environment (e.g., a reconstruction of an archaeological site or a monument) to immerse in an experience that can lead to a deeper understanding of historical data, finds and scientific hypotheses, contributing new interpretations, insights to complex assemblages and learning experiences. After the exploration conducted during the first wave of virtual reality applications in cultural heritage, today we are witnessing the introduction of a new paradigm for the use of immersion in education and cultural settings that is led by the pioneering use of the so-called eXtended Reality (XR) interfaces. The application of XR anticipates new affordances of emerging technologies for spatial presence, immersion in situated information and multi-user interaction in virtual and hybrid environments, over the well-established use of current VR solutions.

In this rapidly changing technological landscape, our session seeks for contributions that discuss and reflect on the new possibilities offered by these modes of immersion for archaeological research as well as education in the space of the museum. This session calls for contributions in, but is not limited to, the following topics:

● Immersion and interaction for research and archaeological data interpretation.

● Immersion and interaction for training in archaeology and heritage sciences.

● Immersion and interaction for education in the museum.

● VR-XR-AR applications in Cultural Heritage.

● Spatial data integration in immersive applications in archaeology.

● What are the VR-XR-AR technological affordances for heritage sciences?

● Immersion and interaction for the study of difficult heritage and community engagement.

● Workflows for immersive and interactive applications in Cultural Heritage.