WATERMINING project at the Athens Science Festival!

I-SENSE/ICCS researchers took part in the Athens Science Festival (21,22, and 23 of October 2022), one of the largest science and technology festivals in Greece and represented  WATERMINING project and its activities related to sea, industry and urban mining. WATER-MINING project aims to face current challenges related to water access and help ensure access to clean water and sanitation by exploring alternative water sources and developing innovative solutions for sustainable water management, including tapping into urban and industrial wastewater and seawater desalination. Congratulations to all our researchers who participated during these 3 days, full of ethnusiasm for sharing and disseminating their research results. Participants from ICCS:

• Tina Katika (Senior researcher/Senior project manager)
• Dimitra Tsiakou (Researcher/Project manager)
• Spyros Bolierakis (AR development team leader)
• Orestis Sampson (Senior software developer)
• Tom Papaioannou (AR developer)
• Vasilis Nousis (User Experience designer, visualization expert)
• Tassos Katsikas (3D content creator)
• Nikoletta Karitsioti (Project Communication Manager)
• Vaggelis Tsougiannis (Front-End development team Leader)
• George Tsimiklis (Team leader in Smart Integrated Systems)

To showcase the project in a wide, heterogenous audience, our researchers using the Augmented Reality (AR) tool, customized content retrieved from three Case Studies (CS2, CS4, and CS5) to demonstrate the water circularity and technical, environmental, and economic indicators associated with the specific demo sites. The AR tool (namely CirculAR) is a visualization tool aiming to engage end-users to the circular economy water use, empower them towards these concepts and ensure maximum visibility of the WATERMINING activities. To meet the purposes of the ASF and ensure a captivating experience for the end-users  ICCS created a WATERMINING treasure hunt game, where end-users were called to enter a map and look for our virtual assistant ARis, who aimed to educate about the WATERMINING activities through virtual content. Along with REVOLVE, DECHEMA, EXCITE and SciCo, the demonstration activity was planned and organized as follows: Our researchers prepared the virtual WATERMINING campaign addressed to the audience participating to the ASF using the AR content management system. The campaigns were prepared based on the content collected from the CS but also from digital 3D material prepared from ICCS to ensure an engaging activity for all participants of all ages. Quiz questions and object recognition features were also utilized to educate further and ensure an even more immersive experience. During the 3-day demonstration feedback was continuously gathered from the end-users (more than 2000 students from various schools visited the exhibitions!). Interviews and discussions conducted during the event ensured that the feedback was collected in a structured way. The development and User Experience (UX) team from ICCS participated and drove the discussions to ensure that the feedback gathered will be used for the final fine-tuning of the AR app, so as to use the updated AR app for training purposes.