Faculty Education award for Innovation

Congratulations to our Institute of Cardiovascular Science team on being awarded a Faculty Education award for Innovation in the use of virtual reality (VR) applied to teaching modules on congenital heart disease and microvascular biology for our iBSc and MSc Cardiovascular Science students. 

The team - Dr Claudio Capelli, Mr Endrit Pajaziti, Prof Andrew Cook, Dr Paul Frankel and Prof Silvia Schievano – conduct pioneering research in Virtual Reality (VR) which they have applied to enhance teaching. 

The students and tutor are completely immersed in a simulated environment via a VR headset.  This approach was initially used during the Covid-19 pandemic to bring together students studying virtually the Congenital Heart Disease – Fundamentals module with their tutor in a virtual classroom, when in person demonstration using the unique, ethically approved archive of rare human heart specimens was not possible.  Supplementing morphology practical sessions, VR is now a popular part of this module’s teaching, allowing students to view, slice and interact with models of hearts with congenital heart diseases in ways that are not possible with precious and fragile human specimens.  VR is also used in the Microvascular Biology module, in which students explore how growth of very small blood vessels is regulated, and it has been popular in a range of other teaching scenarios including for a UCL student surgical society.

The Team has also been shortlisted for the UCL Provost's Education Award.