Hundreds of children experienced the applications of AR and VR at the Timisoara Science Festival
Hundreds of children experienced the applications of AR and VR at the Timisoara Science Festival
Politehnica University Timisoara, through the ID / IFR and e- Learning Center and the Multimedia Center, was present on Saturday, September 14th at the second edition of the "Timisoara Science Festival". Organized under the umbrella of "Romanian Science Festival", the event took place at Iulius Garden and was dedicated to students passionate about science. The UPT team stand gathered hundreds of students willing to experiment and explore the world with the help of new science and technologies, using the latest generation VR (virtual reality) glasses, under the guidance of the researchers at CeL.
Virtual worlds, augmented realities and many games and educational science applications - these were just a few of the attractions that gathered hundreds of children at the UPT stand at Timișoara Science Festival Timișoara. Here, researchers from the ID / IFR and e- Learning Center and the Multimedia Center welcomed the little ones with very good disposition, state-of-the-art VR glasses and equipment and explained to those interested the "science" behind the technologies used.
In addition, students passionate about technology had the opportunity to find out what are the latest innovations in the field of augmented and virtual reality applications and games and were able to create, within minutes, their own 3D imaginary world which they then visited using mobile phone.
The center's virtual reality equipment (Oculus Rift and Oculus Go glasses) as well as the Cospaces educational platform were the attractions of the CeL stand. The children explored spacecraft, climbed Everest, were among the dinosaurs, or did math or physics exercises in a virtual environment. In Cospaces they created content that could be used within the Spotlight Heritage project that UPT is running under the aegis of Timișoara 2021 European Capital of Culture. The stand also presented the European projects Erasmus + Digital Culture and Open Virtual Mobility.
The ID / IFR and e- Learning Center has been involved for some years in AR / VR research (augmented and virtual reality) through the teachers and researchers associated with the center. Participation in some European projects, partnerships with other university centers and ICT companies in Timisoara have led to a good mastery of the field, materialized also by a series of scientific articles published in international conferences and journals.
Timișoara Science Festival, under the aegis of Romanian Science Festival is an event designed to support alternative education in Romania, following the model of western science fairs. The 2019 edition took place in 3 cities - Timisoara, Baia Mare and Pitesti, with the aim of promoting the sciences, such as mathematics, physics, astronomy, chemistry, biology and others.
The ID / IFR and e- Learning Center ( CeL ) established in 1998, an integral part of Politehnica University Timisoara (UPT) aims to initiate, promote and manage distance learning in the university. CeL organized specializations - Technologies and Telecommunications Systems, Applied Computer Science, Communication and Public Relations under distance learning cycle license and Manufacturing Engineering under the cycle time education license. CeL offers support and organizes vocational training courses. CeL developed CV - UPT Virtual Campus, an online educational support environment for all UPT faculties and for distance learning. CeL initiates and carries out international research and projects in the field of eLearning and blended learning, mobile learning, online courses (MOOC), open educational resources (OER) and open education, augmented and virtual reality.
The Center for Multimedia Research (established in 1996), carries out educational, research and innovation activities in the context of information and communication technologies, focusing in recent years on interactive multimedia technologies and technologies, Smart Cities, Open Data, Augmented Reality, Internet of Things, ICT Entrepreneurship, ICT and Multimedia Promotion, Advanced Educational Technologies, OER, MOOCs. The Multimedia Center carries out activities to support entrepreneurship in ICT ( StartUp Weekend, HackTM, Hackaton, Meet-ups ) and organizes the IDMSC International Digital Media Student Contest student competition annually. The Multimedia Center supports the educational specializations at the bachelor's level Telecommunications Technologies and Systems - Multimedia, and 2 master's programs in Multimedia Technologies and, respectively, Technologies, Systems and Applications for eActivities.
