UCF’s Carolina Cruz-Neira Receives 2026 XR Women Innovator of the Year Award

June 25, 2026

Carolina Cruz-Neira, executive director of the Pegasus Research Institute (PRI) and director of the University of Central Florida Institute for Simulation & Training (UCF IST), received the 2026 Innovator of the Year Award from Women in XR during the 6th Annual XR Women Awards, held in conjunction with the Augmented World Expo (AWE) June 15-18 in Long Beach, California.

The XR Women Awards recognize women and allies whose leadership, innovation, and mentorship are advancing the augmented, virtual, and extended reality industry. Cruz-Neira received the Innovator of the Year Award in recognition of her decades of leadership and pioneering contributions to virtual reality, immersive visualization, and extended reality technologies.

UCF also earned an Auggie Award for Best Interaction Product of the Year for “Be There Without Being There: Humanoid Robot Immersive Telepresence” at AWE 2026, highlighting the university’s leadership in extended reality research. Cruz-Neira co-led the award-winning project with Dirk Reiners, associate professor in UCF’s Department of Computer Science and co-director of IST’s Virtual and Augmented Reality Laboratory (VARLAB), and Mohsen Rakhshan, director of UCF’s Laboratory for Interaction of Machine and Brain (LIMB). The project was developed with contributions from students and was selected over finalists that included Google and other leading technology companies.

“This recognition from Women in XR is especially meaningful because it reflects the work of so many outstanding colleagues, students, and collaborators who continue to push the boundaries of immersive technologies,” Cruz-Neira said. “UCF has built an environment where innovation thrives, and I’m honored to be part of a community that is shaping the future of extended reality.”

A pioneer in immersive visualization and virtual reality, Cruz-Neira has spent her career advancing technologies that improve how people interact with digital environments. Her research has influenced academia, industry, and government while helping position UCF as a global leader in simulation and extended reality research.

Cruz-Neira also serves as co-director of the UCF Virtual and Augmented Reality Laboratory (VARLAB) with Reiners. The interdisciplinary research lab advances virtual, augmented, and mixed reality technologies by bringing together faculty and students from across disciplines to develop immersive systems, interactive visualization tools, and human-computer interfaces that address real-world challenges in education, healthcare, manufacturing, defense, and workforce training.

Together, the XR Women Innovator of the Year Award and the Auggie Award for Best Interaction Product of the Year recognize both Cruz-Neira’s pioneering contributions and the collaborative culture at UCF IST, where faculty and students continue developing next-generation technologies with real-world impact.