IEEE 2026 Awardee Gregory Welch: Strengthening the VR Research Community Through Leadership and Service Pegasus Professor Gregory Welchβs decades of service have had a sustained impact, helping to strengthen the global virtual reality community and earning recognition from the IEEE Visualization and Graphics Technical Community.
IEEE 2026 Awardee Carolina Cruz-Neira: Turning a βPlan Bβ Into a Global Legacy The virtual reality pioneer, who has earned the IEEE VGTC Virtual Reality Lifetime Achievement Award, continues to push boundaries and ask questions like, βWhat can we create next?β
2 ΒιΆΉΣ³»΄«Γ½ Faculty Earn Prestigious IEEE Recognitions in Virtual Reality Agere Chair Professor Carolina Cruz-Neira and Pegasus Professor Gregory Welch have been honored by the IEEE VGTC Virtual Reality Academy, receiving lifetime achievement and service awards, respectively, for their significant contributions to immersive technology.
U.S. Under Secretary of Education Nicholas Kent Visits ΒιΆΉΣ³»΄«Γ½ Kent joined ΒιΆΉΣ³»΄«Γ½ officials to learn more about how the university prepares graduates for career success, meets industry demands and leads cutting-edge research for global impact.
2 Knights Honored With Forbesβ 50 Over 50 Award The honorees include a modeling and simulation faculty member who is a VR pioneer, as well as an alumna who has made impacts in tech, TV, and startup funding.
ΒιΆΉΣ³»΄«Γ½ Ranks Among Nationβs Top 5 Most Innovative Public Universities U.S. News & World Report‘s 2025 Best Colleges list recognizes ΒιΆΉΣ³»΄«Γ½ for its excellence in innovation, student success and undergraduate education.
ΒιΆΉΣ³»΄«Γ½ Graduate Programs in Engineering, Computer Science Highlight Research in U.S. News Rankings Breakthroughs in AI, virtual and augmented reality, hypersonic propulsion, cybersecurity, robotics and more are pushing the envelope for ΒιΆΉΣ³»΄«Γ½βs engineering programs.
ΒιΆΉΣ³»΄«Γ½ Computer Science Professor to Be Inducted to the XR Hall of Fame Carolina Cruz-Neira is a pioneer in the areas of virtual reality and interactive visualization, having created and deployed a variety of technologies that have become standard tools in industry, government and academia.
ΒιΆΉΣ³»΄«Γ½ Enters $6M Cooperative Agreement to Develop Research Commercialization Hub The U.S. National Science Foundation award will allow for the creation of a Venture Lab to connect ΒιΆΉΣ³»΄«Γ½ researchers with local industry, investors and entrepreneurs.
ΒιΆΉΣ³»΄«Γ½ Leads Development of First Large-scale System for Extended Reality Research The nearly $5 million project will facilitate human subjects research to improve extended reality technologies for the general population and make them more available to groups such as older adults or people with disabilities.
