Improving ACTRIS Scientific Outreach through Immersive Virtual Tours

The rapid advances in computing, multimedia, and virtual reality technologies provides new opportunities for communicating and visualising scientific information. Virtual Tours (VTs), based on 360-degree imagery enriched with multimedia content such as graphical explanations, audio and videos offer a user-friendly way to explore scientific facilities. Interactive navigation enables users to understand research infrastructures from multiple perspectives and at their own pace.

Within ACTRIS-FR, the French component of the European Aerosol, Clouds and Trace Gases research infrastructure (ACTRIS), VTs serve as a tool to make atmospheric research stations more accessible and transparent. Historically, ACTRIS facilities - observation stations, mobile platforms and atmospheric simulation chambers -  have often been associated with limited accessibility due to security, safety, or logistical constraints. VTs break down these barriers by providing a realistic and informative representation of the facilities, enabling students, visiting researchers, and the general public to better understand the scale, layout, and purpose of the instruments and measurements before visiting, or even when travel is restricted.

The approach was developed in collaboration with SMEAR Estonia platform’s developer. The methodology allows the creation of tailored content for different target groups: for example, technicians may access specific data sets/curves, and documentation, while educators and outreach professionals can integrate simplified explanations, posters, links to videos  to support teaching. This flexibility allows a single VT to be easily tailored to various uses, ranging from outreach and training to scientific communication and access preparation.

Several ACTRIS-FR sites already use VTs to strengthen their visibility and foster greater user interaction. The tours can be embedded in websites, communication materials via QR codes and showcased at conferences, exhibitions, or as part of transnational access projects such as the Horizon Europe project IRISCC. They also support ACTRIS’s broader mission of modernising outreach activities and improving interaction with the education sector and the general public.

Developing high-quality VTs poses several challenges, as producing accurate and meaningful content requires significant involvement from scientists and technical staff, along with time-consuming data collection and careful attention to visual resolution and metadata consistency. 

The poster will outline the development of ACTRIS France VTs, discussing both the benefits and limitations, while also exploring opportunities to integrate multimedia. It will also emphasize the value of VTs as training tools for technicians, scientists, and students, and their potential to enhance accessibility, transparency, and cross-country collaborations. The tours not only facilitate a deeper understanding of the work being conducted at the facility, but also contribute to raising general awareness and knowledge about distributed research infrastructures, promoting a broader appreciation of the complex research ecosystem.