News & Press

Thursday, April 30, 2026

Dr. Asher Marks delivered a keynote talk titled “AI in Cancer Care: Paging Dr. ChatGPT?” at CancerCon 2026, held from April 30 to May 3 in Seattle, WA. His talk explored the growing role of artificial intelligence in cancer care and its potential to transform clinical decision-making and patient support.

Saturday, April 18, 2026

Dr. Veronica Weser presented a talk entitled “Chopsticks, Tennis Rackets, and Canes: What Tool Experts Reveal About Embodiment”at 2pm as part of the Sports Neuroscience Breakout Session. The International Symposium on Embodied Cognition (ISEC 2026) brought together leading researchers, clinicians, educators, and students to explore the dynamic connections among body, brain, and behavior. 

Monday, April 6, 2026

Cutie, a virtual reality intervention designed to support infection-prevention education for parents of high-risk infants in the NICU, was named a 2026 EdTech Awards Cool Tool Finalist in the VR/AR Solution category.

Thursday, March 26, 2026

Dr. Kimberly Hieftje moderated a symposia and gave a talk on No Screen, No Problem: Designing Non-Visual Immersive Experiences for Clinical and Community Settings and Dr. Frank Lee, our collaborator at Drexel University, gave a talk on From Idea to Award: How a Four-Institution Consortium Secured an NIH STTR for Life at 100.4. 

Wednesday, March 25, 2026

Year of the Cicadas, created by Dr. Kimberly Hieftje with Dr. Asher Marks and Andrew Schartmann, received an Honorable Mention for the Best XR Gallery Award at the 33rd IEEE Conference on Virtual Reality and 3D User Interfaces (IEEE VR 2026) in Daegu, South Korea.

Wednesday, March 25, 2026

Drs. Kimberly Hieftje, Shu Wei, and Veronica Weser represented XR Pediatrics at the 33rd IEEE Conference on Virtual Reality and 3D User Interfaces (IEEE VR 2026). They led the tutorial, "The Game Playbook: Designing for Serious Games," and showcased The Arborist and Year of the Cicadas as technology demonstrations. Year of the Cicadas also received an Honorable Mention for Best XR Gallery. Feedback from the tutorial and demonstrations is informing continued refinement of the Game Playbook framework and future immersive experiences.

Saturday, March 7, 2026

Palomi Kurade, our postgraduate associate, presented findings from our DPH- and NIH-funded Invite Only VR vaping prevention program evaluation at the 2026 SRNT Annual Meeting.

She presented her poster, “Evaluating a Virtual-Reality Video Game for Nicotine and Cannabis E-Cigarette Prevention in Middle School Students,” highlighting feasibility, acceptability, and preliminary efficacy findings from a VR-based prevention pilot trial. Palomi also delivered a paper presentation, “Vaping to Cope: A Qualitative Study of Middle School Students’ Perceptions of the Mental Health Impacts of Nicotine and Cannabis Vaping,” examining how adolescents perceive vaping as a strategy for managing stress and emotional distress.

Tuesday, February 17, 2026

Dr. Kimberly Hieftje and Bernard François, Preview Labs founder, gave a TED-style talk hosted by the Center for Transformative Media. The talk included topics about immersive media and VR storytelling! 

Thursday, February 12, 2026

Dr. Kimberly Hieftje gave a featured talk at the MiamiXR Conference from February 12 - 13, in Miami. Her talk focused on the development and evaluation of XR-based video-game interventions for health prevention and behavior change in adolescents and young adults.

Monday, January 26, 2026

Our Associate Research Scientist, Dr. Shu Wei, and her interdisciplinary team developed Love, Hate and Robot, an award-winning mixed-reality prototype presented at Reality Hack @ MIT 2026. The project is a playful XR “dreaming machine” that externalizes everyday inner conflicts by combining Android XR, Gemini Live, and a Unitree humanoid robot to support reflective and confident decision-making.