XRNet: Networked Extended Reality for Collaborative Rehabilitation

About

Networked Extended Reality for Collaborative Rehabilitation

Extended reality (XR) technologies have shown significant promise in increasing user engagement and skill acquisition in a variety of domains. The goal of this project is to accelerate adoption of innovative XR applications for rehabilitation, for example to enhance user experiences in treatments to improve motor function for certain diseases. This project develops immersive XR exercise environments that connects geo-distributed users and enables them to move and interact in 3D space with each other and with virtual elements. A key objective is to make the experience of rehabilitation more enjoyable and effective by incorporating social interactions between remote users that can boost engagement and skill acquisition. The technology also allows clinicians to guide and interact with their patients remotely. To create a virtual environment that users experience as fast and seamless, this project develops novel approaches to the underlying networking infrastructure needed to run the application, including at the 5G and Internet layers.

Also check out our sister Breaking Low projects, Agora and Drive Safe.

Exposing and Exploiting Path Diversity

Use our Edge Fabric and PAINTER systems to prioritize XR flows.

XR-Aware 5G RAN Adaptation

XR-in-Loop RAN management.

Multi-User XR Rehabilitation Activities

Multi-user XR rehab — social, engaging, clinician-guided in real time.

News

June 15, 2026: WordPlay was shown at the Augmented World Expo in Long Beach, CA, an important industry forum. [video]
June 1, 2026: Demo 1 was held at the University of Michigan. [photos][XRbility LLC promo]
April 28, 2026: Two of XRNet's applications, WordPlay and iGYM AR, were demoed at the UIUC IMMERSE Symposium. It was a great forum to share our knowledge with XR enthusiasts and other Breaking Low teams. [WordPlay abstract][iGYM AR abstract]
Dec. 4, 2025: First quarter of the project successfully concluded. We had some nice news articles written about the project at the University of Michigan [link] (we made the front page!) and at Columbia [link].
Nov 6, 2025: Demonstrated tabletop networked iGYM at ACM MobiCom 2025 in Hong Kong. [details] [video]
Oct 1, 2025: The XRNet project officially launches! Let's go!
Sept 14, 2025: Received support from the NSF TIP directorate's Breaking Low program. Thank you NSF! [NSF announcement]

Key Components

Explore the key components of our project

iGYM

Accessible AR exercise

WordPlay VR

Cognitive-motor XR exergames for people with Parkinson's disease

Testbeds

Experimentation across domains and sites

Timeline

Our milestones and plans

October 1, 2025

Project Official Launch

The official start of the XRNet project.
June 1, 2026

Project Demo 1

First demo with XR rehabilitation apps with application and network low latency techniques at University of Michigan. We showcased four demos: iGYM AR, iGYM VR, WordPlay, and real-time WebRTC streaming with underlying server and path selection. [photos]
February 2027

Project Demo 2

Demo 2 with XR rehabilitation apps with app-level and 5G ORAN adaptations; WAN unified ingress path and server selection.
October 2027

Project Demo 3

Multi-site demo 3 of XR rehabilitation apps with app-level, 5G ORAN, and WAN adaptation.