Travel: NSF Student Travel Grant for 2025 Doctoral Consortium (DC) at the IEEE International Symposium on Mixed and Augmented Reality (ISMAR)

This award will partially fund attendance for ten students attending the doctoral consortium for the 2025 IEEE International Symposium on Mixed and Augmented Reality (ISMAR). ISMAR is a well-known venue for research on the underlying technologies for virtual, mixed, and augmented reality. ISMAR also includes research on effective methods for interaction with, in, and through these systems and on applications of these technologies to socially important areas, including education, training, communication, and entertainment. The doctoral consortium will allow student attendees to present their research interests, plans, and results to a panel of researchers in related fields and receive specific and constructive feedback. At the conference's poster session, students will get in-depth feedback through one-on-one meetings with their mentors, and broader perspectives from expert and student peers from a wide variety of disciplinary, topical, and institutional backgrounds. The agenda of the doctoral consortium was designed specifically to help student participants to "think big" and develop the strategic insight and long-range vision that will help guide them toward continued important contributions to science and engineering research beyond graduate school. Beyond its impact on the research itself, the doctoral consortium will have a broader impact on both student attendees and the research community. Through interactions at the doctoral consortium and the conference itself, students will be able to develop their professional networks in the ISMAR research community as well as their awareness of and ability to navigate future career paths. Students are selected based on the quality of their applications, financial need, first time attendee status, and their ability to contribute a breadth of perspectives to the doctoral consortium that will enhance the experience for all attendees. This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.