Assistant Professor, New Jersey Institute of Technology

Dr. Salam Daher is an assistant professor in informatics and computer science at New Jersey Institute of Technology (NJIT). She is a courtesy faculty at University of Central Florida (UCF). She has a PhD in Modeling and Simulation (UCF, 2018) and a postdoc focusing on healthcare simulation & technology (UCF, 2019), an MS in digital arts and sciences (UF engineering, 2006), and a BS in Computer Science with a minor in Mathematics (LAU, 2004). Her research focuses on healthcare simulation and technology, as well as collaborative projects involving other disciplines such as education, and languages to solve real world problems. Her expertise and interests include computer graphics, VR/AR/MR, synthetic environments, interactive 3D virtual humans with animated facial expressions, speech, and body language for the purposes of simulation and training in the education, military, and healthcare domains. Before her PhD, she worked in the industry for more than 5 years where she gained experience as a multimedia software developer leading projects in simulation and training.

Select Awards

- National Center for Women and Technology (NCWIT) 2018 Scholarship (awarded to only 4 STEM students from 91 two-year and four-year U.S. Universities.)

- RADM Fred Lewis I/ITSEC 2017 Scholarship (awarded to only 3 PhD students.)

- IEEE VR 2017 Doctoral Consortium (awarded to 12 PhD students internationally.)

- Link Fellowship for Modeling, Simulation and Training 2016 (awarded to 4 PhD students)

- UCF Modeling and Simulation Scholarship (2013, 2014, and 2015)

Publications and Presentations

Papers

Gonzalez, L., Daher, S., & Welch, G. (2020). Neurological Assessment Using a Physical-Virtual Patient (PVP). Simulation & Gaming.

Daher, S., Hochreiter, J., Schubert, R., Gonzalez, L., Cendan, J., Anderson, M., ... & Welch, G. F. (2020). The physical-virtual patient simulator: A physical human form with virtual appearance and behavior. Simulation in Healthcare, 15(2), 115-121.

Richards, K., Mahalanobis, N., Kim, K., Schubert, R., Lee, M., Daher, S., ... & Welch, G. (2019, October). Analysis of Peripheral Vision and Vibrotactile Feedback During Proximal Search Tasks with Dynamic Virtual Entities in Augmented Reality. In Symposium on Spatial User Interaction (pp. 1-9).

Daher, S. (2018). Physical-virtual Patient Simulators: Bringing Tangible Humanity to Simulated Patients (Doctoral dissertation, University of Central Florida).

Norouzi, N., Kim, K., Hochreiter, J., Lee, M., Daher, S., Bruder, G., & Welch, G. (2018, November). A systematic survey of 15 years of user studies published in the intelligent virtual agents conference. In Proceedings of the 18th international conference on intelligent virtual agents (pp. 17-22).

Daher, S., Hochreiter, J., Norouzi, N., Gonzalez, L., Bruder, G., & Welch, G. (2018, November). Physical-Virtual Agents for Healthcare Simulation. In Proceedings of the 18th International Conference on Intelligent Virtual Agents (pp. 99-106).

Hochreiter, J., Daher, S., Bruder, G., & Welch, G. (2018, March). Cognitive and touch performance effects of mismatched 3D physical and visual perceptions. In 2018 IEEE Conference on Virtual Reality and 3D User Interfaces (VR) (pp. 1-386). IEEE.

Daher, S: Physical-Virtual Patient Bed. 2017. Link Foundation Fellowship Final Reports: Modeling, Simulation, and Training Program. Retrieved from The Scholarship Repository of Florida Institute of Technology website: https://repository.lib.fit.edu/).

Daher, S., Kim, K., Lee, M., Schubert, R., Bruder, G., Bailenson, J., & Welch, G. (2017, August). Effects of social priming on social presence with intelligent virtual agents. In International Conference on Intelligent Virtual Agents (pp. 87-100). Springer, Cham.

Schubert, R., Welch, G., Daher, S., & Raij, A. (2016). HuSIS: A Dedicated Space for Studying Human Interactions. IEEE computer graphics and applications, 36(6), 26-36.

Lee, M., Kim, K., Daher, S., Raij, A., Schubert, R., Bailenson, J., & Welch, G. (2016, March). The wobbly table: Increased social presence via subtle incidental movement of a real-virtual table. In 2016 IEEE Virtual Reality (VR) (pp. 11-17). IEEE.

Hochreiter, J., Daher, S., Nagendran, A., Gonzalez, L., & Welch, G. (2016). Optical touch sensing on nonparametric rear-projection surfaces for interactive physical-virtual experiences. PRESENCE: Teleoperators and Virtual Environments, 25(1), 33-46.

Hochreiter, J., Daher, S., Nagendran, A., Gonzalez, L., & Welch, G. (2015, March). Touch sensing on non-parametric rear-projection surfaces: A physical-virtual head for hands-on healthcare training. In 2015 IEEE Virtual Reality (VR) (pp. 69-74). IEEE.

Posters

Daher, S., Hochreiter, J., Norouzi, N., Schubert, R., Bruder, G., Gonzalez, L., ... & Welch, G. (2019, March). Matching vs. Non-Matching Visuals and Shape for Embodied Virtual Healthcare Agents. In 2019 IEEE Conference on Virtual Reality and 3D User Interfaces (VR) (pp. 886-887). IEEE.

Daher, S. (2017, March). Optical see-through vs. spatial augmented reality simulators for medical applications. In 2017 IEEE Virtual Reality (VR) (pp. 417-418). IEEE

Daher, S., Kim, K., Lee, M., Bruder, G., Schubert, R., Bailenson, J., & Welch, G. F. (2017, March). Can social presence be contagious? Effects of social presence priming on interaction with Virtual Humans. In 2017 IEEE Symposium on 3D User Interfaces (3DUI) (pp. 201-202). IEEE.

Daher, S; Welch, G: [POSTER] Humanikins: Humanity Transfer to Physical Manikins. 22nd Medicine Meets Virtual Reality (NextMed / MMVR), Los Angeles, CA, USA, 2016.

Welch, G; Daher, S; Hochreiter, J; Gonzalez, L: Interactive Rear-Projection Physical-Virtual Patient Simulators. 22nd Medicine Meets Virtual Reality (NextMed / MMVR), Los Angeles, CA, USA, 2016.

Daher, S; Gonzalez, L; Welch, G: Preliminary Assessment of Neurologic Symptomatology Using an Interactive Physical-Virtual Head with Touch. 17th International Meeting on Simulation in Healthcare (IMSH 2016), 2016.

Daher, S; Kim, K; Lee, M; Raij, A; Schubert, R; Bailenson, J; Welch, G: [POSTER] Exploring Social Presence Transfer in Real-Virtual Human Interaction. Proceedings of IEEE Virtual Reality 2016, Greenville, SC, USA, 2016.

Presentations

Gonzalez, L; Daher, S; Welch, G: Vera Real : Stroke Assessment Using a Physical Virtual Patient (PVP). INACSL 2019.

Aebersold, M; Daher, S; Foronda, C; Tiffany, J; Verkuyl, Margaret: Virtual/ Augmented Reality for Health Professions Education Symposium. INACSL 2019.

Daher, S; Kollipara, V: NCWIT Panel. 05.05.2019.

Daher, S: Patient Simulators: the Past, Present, and Future. 21.01.2019.

Gonzalez, L; Daher, S; Hochreiter, J; Welch, G: Student Nursing Assessment of Discrete Neurology Symptoms using an Interactive Physical Virtual Head. Presentation at International Nursing Association for Clinical Simulation and Learning, 2016.

2013-2018 : PhD, University of Central Florida

During her PhD, she developed a new class of augmented reality patient simulators called Physical-Virtual Patients (PVP). The PVP allows healthcare educators to interact with a life-size simulated patient by providing real-time physical tactile cues (e.g. temperature, pulse), auditory cues (e.g. speech, heart sounds), and rich dynamic visual cues such as facial expressions (e.g. pain, emotions) and changes in appearance (e.g. skin color, wounds). She designed and lead studies to evaluate the PVP with nursing and medical students.[link]

2006-2012: Vcom3D, Orlando FL

Salam's professional experience includes working as digital media software developer with Vcom3D, Inc since 2007 developing virtual training and simulations that include realistic 3D avatars. She is trained and certified in Paul Ekman's Facial Action Coding System (FACS) used for making the realistic 3D facial expressions. Her experience covers but is not limited to 3D modeling and animation, 2D Graphics and interface design, audio and video recording and editing, creating storyboards and content, creating prototypes, writing software and integrating all of the above, testing products and leading projects from start to finish including interfacing with customers and subject matter experts. She worked on many projects involving foreign languages where she interacts with people from different cultures and languages. Being a native Arabic and French speaker and an excellent English speaker helped her interface better with subject matter experts from different parts of the world to create software and content for language and culture training. Also, she can get through a basic conversation with American Sign Language since she got the chance to sign with deaf people at work.

2004-2006: Masters, University of Florida

Ms Daher graduated in 2006 from University of Florida with a Masters degree in Digital Arts & Sciences (Engineering) with a GPA of 3.8/4.0. She has teaching experience for 2 undergraduate courses at University of Florida, one is "Theory and Practice of Multimedia Production"and the other one is "Math, Art and Computing". Also during her graduate study she worked as a software developer and 3D modeler with the Digital Worlds Institute where she was part of the development and optimization team of a virtual 3D map of University of Florida in a CAVE like environment.

Digital Worlds Institute, University of Florida

As a part of a virtual environment team, she developed a low budget 3D Space Mission simulation ride in a CAVE like environment. Salam and 2 teammates built the hardware platform and the software from scratch in 1000 hours total during one semester. The project was featured on the main webpage of the department of Computer and Information Science and Engineering for over 1 year. Digital Worlds institute at University of Florida bought the project from the team to continue using it for further research.

2000-2004: BS in Computer Science

Since 2000 and during her BS in Computer Science (GPA 3.82/4.0) , it has always been Salam's passion to combine arts and science and to keep on learning, working and teaching in the digital media field. During that time, she modeled and led the development of a 3D virtual tour of the Lebanese American University campus to help new students get virtually around the campus.

Salam loves her field and has the mind of an engineer and the heart of an artist. She has a good artistic eye for details and excels in combining both arts and sciences. She is especially interested in user interfaces, user experience, virtual environments, 2D and 3D computer graphics, animation and simulations or related areas.