Wheelchair-MR

Wheelchair-MR extended the earlier Wheelchair-VR research in response to cybersickness experienced in the fully virtual simulator. Unlike Wheelchair-VR, which was used while seated at a PC with a VR headset, Leap Motion and an Xbox controller, Wheelchair-MR was experienced while participants drove a real powered wheelchair through a real environment. Microsoft HoloLens placed virtual wheelchair-training objects within their view of those physical surroundings.

Developed in Unity with the Mixed Reality Toolkit, the prototype combined the wheelchair’s physical controls and movement with virtual objects positioned in the surrounding space. The research examined how mixed reality could support powered-wheelchair manoeuvre training while preserving participants’ awareness of—and movement through—the real world.

Early studies found that the mixed reality approach addressed the cybersickness problem and showed promise as a training environment. The work remained exploratory, with the papers identifying the need for a larger evaluation before drawing firm conclusions about training effectiveness.