Italian University Opens VR CAVE for Aerospace

The University of Bologna has introduced IRIS, a new immersive visualisation facility at its Forlì Campus, developed with ST Engineering Antycip (Antycip) for its Department of Industrial Engineering.

IRIS can operate as a fully immersive CAVE or be adapted for large-scale visualisation. Its research applications include Urban Air Mobility, Human–Machine Interfaces, aircraft cabin design and passenger comfort, full-scale digital prototypes, training and collaborative operations.

The facility was funded through Italy’s National Recovery and Resilience Plan (PNRR), financed by the European Union – NextGenerationEU, and forms part of the National Center for Sustainable Mobility (MOST). Antycip provided and integrated the immersive visualisation system.

“Virtual reality plays a key role by enabling end users to experience and evaluate new technologies and interface concepts long before they become physically available,” said Sara Bagassi, Associate Professor and Co-coordinator of the same research group. “This not only helps users better understand future operational concepts but also provides valuable feedback that can inform and improve the design process.”

“This is a project we are particularly proud of,” said Andrea Gimbo, Business Development Manager for Italy at Antycip. “As our first CAVE delivered in Italy, it represents an important milestone for our team. From the outset, the project was about understanding what the University needed from the environment and creating a system flexible enough to support very different research applications. Seeing IRIS now being used to support real research and future innovation is incredibly rewarding.”