Headshot of Pratheep K Paranthaman

Pratheep K Paranthaman

Associate Professor of Computer Science

Department: Computer Science

Office and address: Duke, Office 101B 2320 Campus Box Elon, NC 27244

Phone number: (336) 278-6233

Professional Expertise

Game Design, Games user research, UI/UX design, and VR/AR/MR

Brief Biography

Dr. Pratheep Paranthaman is an Associate Professor of Computer Science and the coordinator of the Game Design minor at Elon University. Dr. Paranthaman is currently overseeing the Game Design Minor Program in the computer science department. Dr. Paranthaman earned his Ph.D. from the University of Genoa, Italy. During his Ph.D. research phase, he investigated the impacts of Serious Games and designed games for promoting green and safe driving in the automotive sector. He was also associated with an Industrial European Union (EU–FP7) project on safe and collaborative transportation. He earned his Master’s Degree in Artificial Intelligence from Heriot-Watt University, U.K., where his research and analyses focused on Human-Robot Interaction.  Dr. Paranthaman’s research interests include brain-computer interface, mixed reality, virtual reality, games user research, human-computation games, and artificial intelligence. Prior to joining Elon, Dr. Paranthaman worked as a Postdoctoral Researcher and Lecturer at Northeastern University, Boston, MA. During his post-doc research phase, he developed a system called ARAPID (As Rapid As Possible Iterative Design) to streamline the video game playtesting process. 

 

 

News & Notes

Education

Ph.D. University of Genoa, Genoa, Italy

M.S. Artificial Intelligence, Heriot-Watt University, U.K

B.Tech Information Technology, Anna University, India

Courses Taught

  1. Game Design
  2. Game Programming 
  3. Computer Game Production
  4. Collaborative Game Development 1 
  5. Collaborative Game Development 2 
  6. iMedia bootcamp (M.A in Interactive Media program) 
  7. Computer Science 1 
  8. Human-Computer Interaction
  9. Immersive Technologies (cross-listed course with the iMedia program)

 

 

Current Projects

Development and investigation of gameplay interactions and mechanics in mixed reality (MR) games

I'm investigaing the interaction modlaities in mixed reality environment and through this project I aim to analyze the novel ways of incorporating game mechanics in mixed reality space. 

Obstacle Clearance in Virtual and Mixed Reality Vs Real-life (Collaborative Project between Computer Science and Physical Therapy Departments)

I’m currently working on this collaborative project with the physical therapy department to study the obstacle clearance behavior in virtual reality and mixed reality environments.  In this project, I am using Microsoft Hololens 2 and Oculus Quest headsets to generate virtual obstacles of different heights. 

 

Player Brain Activity and Emotions in Virtual Reality

Electroencephalogram(EEG) devices are used by researchers in human-computer interaction, video games and software systems to evaluate the impact of interaction design on user emotions.  In this project, our goal is to evaluate the reliability and accuracy of brain activity data extracted from the EEG device. As of the initial user study, we extracted the player emotions data for three virtual reality games and analyzed the player emotions involved in those games. This research paper has been accepted in IEEE Conference on Games 2021.  Currently, the project is advancing to the next stage, where the focus will be on removing artifacts from the EEG signal for multiple gameplay mechanics involved in virtual reality games. 

 

ARAPID - As Rapid As Possible Iterative Design

ARAPID system is a tool for game developers and this system helps the developers to instantly analyze the design outcomes of their games in a matter of few minutes. I'm exploiting the poitential of crowdsourcing and rapid analytics to tightly couple the testing and development phases together in the game development process to achieve rapid closure of iterative cycles. 

Publications

  • LaMont, L., Fuller, G., Paranthaman, P.K., Poteat, T., Toprani, D., and Xu, Q., (2023). Towards Prototyping Single-modal and Multimodal Interactions in Mixed Reality Games. In: Yang, XS., Sherratt, R.S., Dey, N., Joshi, A. (eds) Proceedings of Eighth International Congress on Information and Communication Technology. ICICT 2023. Lecture Notes in Networks and Systems, vol 694. Springer, Singapore. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-99-3091-3_54 (book chapter)

  • Paranthaman, P.K., Vallabhajosula, S., Giordano, A., Walton, S., Tuisa, O., Bajaj, N. (2023). User Experience Analysis in Obstacle Clearance Tasks in Virtual and Mixed Reality Environments. In: Nagar, A.K., Singh Jat, D., Mishra, D.K., Joshi, A. (eds) Intelligent Sustainable Systems. Lecture Notes in Networks and Systems, vol 579. Springer, Singapore. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-19-7663-6_64 (book chapter)

  • Jennings, D., Paranthaman, P.K., Bajaj, N. (2023). Conceptual Design and Early Prototypes of a Gamified Virtual Reality Interview Training Application. In: Nagar, A.K., Singh Jat, D., Mishra, D.K., Joshi, A. (eds) Intelligent Sustainable Systems. Lecture Notes in Networks and Systems, vol 578. Springer, Singapore. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-19-7660-5_9 (book chapter)

  • Vallabhajosula S, Giordano A, Paranthaman P, Tuisa O, Walton S, Perri S, Paranthaman P. Comparison of Obstacle Clearance Under Mixed, Virtual and Physical Reality Environments. Poster presentation at the 2022 North American Congress on Biomechanics Meeting, Ottawa, ON, August 2022 (Abstract)

  • Walton S, Tuisa O, Perri S, Paranthaman P, Giordano A, Vallabhajosula S. Comparing Obstacle Clearance?in Mixed Reality and Physical Reality. Podium presentation at the 2022 Annual Meeting of the American College of Sports Medicine, San Diego, CA, May 2022 (Abstract)

  • Walton S, Tuisa O, Japit A, Giordano A, Paranthaman P, Vallabhajosula S. Obstacle Clearance Behavior in Mixed Reality While Dual Tasking. Poster presentation at the 2022 APTA-NC Fall Conference, High Point, NC, October 2022 (Abstract)

  • Walton S, Tuisa O, Giordano A, Paranthaman P, Vallabhajosula S. Obstacle Clearance Behavior in Mixed Reality While Dual Tasking. Accepted for poster presentation at the 2023 APTA Combined Sections Meeting, San Diego, TX, February 2023 (Abstract)

  • Jennings D, Paranthaman P. Development and Effectiveness of a Gamified Virtual Reality Interview Trainer. Accepted for oral presentation in SNCURCS - State of North Carolina Undergraduate Research & Creativity Symposium (fall conference - 2021). (Abstract)

  • Wilson A, Go C, Japit A, Lawler M, Walton S, Tuisa O, Paranthaman P, Giordano A, Vallabhajosula S. Mixed and Virtual Reality Obstacle Clearance Behavior in Older Adults. Abstract submitted for review to the 2023 Annual Meeting of the American College of Sports Medicine, Denver, CO, May 2023 (Abstract)

  • Paranthaman, P. K., Bajaj, N., Solovey, N., & Jennings, D. (2021, August). Comparative Evaluation of the EEG Performance Metrics and Player Ratings on the Virtual Reality Games. In 2021 IEEE Conference on Games (CoG) (pp. 1-8). IEEE. (Conference paper)

  • Paranthaman, P. K., Sarkar, A., & Cooper, S. (2021, August). Applying Rapid Crowdsourced Playtesting to a Human Computation Game. In The 16th International Conference on the Foundations of Digital Games (FDG) 2021 (pp. 1-7). (Conference paper)

  • Paranthaman, P. K., & Cooper, S. (2019, October). ARAPID: towards integrating crowdsourced playtesting into the game development environment. In Proceedings of the Annual Symposium on Computer-Human Interaction in Play (pp. 121-133). (Conference paper)

  • Dange, G.R., Paranthaman, P.K., Bellotti, F., Samaritani, M., Berta, R., De Gloria, A. (2017). Assessment of Driver Behavior Based on Machine Learning Approaches in a Social Gaming Scenario. In: De Gloria, A. (eds) Applications in Electronics Pervading Industry, Environment and Society. ApplePies 2016. Lecture Notes in Electrical Engineering, vol 409. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-47913-2_24 (book chapter)

  • Bellotti, F., Berta, R., Gloria, A. D., Dange, G., Paranthaman, P. K., Curatelli, F., ... & Hausler, F. (2015, December). A smart mobility serious game concept and business development study. In International Conference on Games and Learning Alliance (pp. 385-392). Springer, Cham. (book chapter)

  • Bellotti, F., Berta, R., Paranthaman, P.K., Dange, G., & Gloria, A. D. (2020). REAL: Reality-Enhanced Applied Games," in IEEE Transactions on Games, vol. 12, no. 3, pp. 281-290, Sept. 2020, doi: 10.1109/TG.2019.2940108. (Journal article)

  • Paranthaman, P.K., Bellotti, F., Berta, R., Dange, G., De Gloria, A. (2019). User Preferences for a Serious Game to Improve Driving. In: Gentile, M., Allegra, M., Söbke, H. (eds) Games and Learning Alliance. GALA 2018. Lecture Notes in Computer Science(), vol 11385. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-11548-7_45 (book chapter)

  • Bellotti, F., Kopetzki, S., Berta, R., Paranthaman, P. K., Dange, G. R., Lytrivis, P., ... & De Gloria, A. (2018). Team applications for collaborative road mobility. IEEE Transactions on Industrial Informatics, 15(2), 1105-1119. (Journal article)

  • Drakoulis, R., Bellotti, F., Bakas, I., Berta, R., Paranthaman, P. K., Dange, G. R., ... & Amditis, A. (2018). A gamified flexible transportation service for on-demand public transport. IEEE Transactions on Intelligent Transportation Systems, 19(3), 921-933.  (Journal article)

  • Dange, G. R., Paranthaman, P. K., Bellotti, F., Berta, R., De Gloria, A., Raffero, M., & Neumeier, S. (2017, June). Deployment of serious gaming approach for safe and sustainable mobility. In 2017 IEEE Intelligent Vehicles Symposium (IV) (pp. 1222-1227). IEEE. (Conference paper)

  • Paranthaman, P. K., Dange, G. R., Bellotti, F., Berta, R., Gloria, A. D., Zitti, E. D., ... & Sciutto, G. (2016, September). A Serious Game Architecture for Green Mobility. In International Conference on Applications in Electronics Pervading Industry, Environment and Society (pp. 66-76). Springer, Cham. (book chapter)

  • Paranthaman, P. K., Dange, G. R., Bellotti, F., Berta, R., & Gloria, A. D. (2016, December). Gamification of car driver performance. In International Conference on Games and Learning Alliance (pp. 302-308). Springer, Cham. (book chapter)

  • DellAcqua, P., Bellotti, F., Berta, R., De Gloria, A., Dange, G., Paranthaman, P., ... & Thiele, F. M. (2015, August). Safe drive map concept for road curve monitoring. In 2015 Euromicro Conference on Digital System Design (pp. 293-296). IEEE. (Conference paper)

  • Dange, G. R., Paranthaman, P. K., Samaritani, M., Smiai, O., Bellotti, F., Berta, R., ... & Pontow, J. (2015, December). The absolute and social comparative analysis of driver performance on a simulated road network. In International Conference on Games and Learning Alliance (pp. 375-384). Springer, Cham. (book chapter)

  • Ailinca, M., Paranthaman, P. K., Pessin, G., Osório, F. S., Souza, J. R., Wolf, D. F., ... & Vargas, P. A. (2012). Uncovering New Neural Network Topologies in Real World Robot Applications. In 12th Annual Workshop on Computational Intelligence (UKCI)–Studies in Mathematical and Computer Science, Edinburgh, UK: Heriot Watt University (pp. 53-58). (Conference paper)

Workshops

Towards Social Serious Gaming in the IoT Concept and prototype development

F. Bellotti, R. Berta, A. De Gloria, G. Dange, P. Paranthaman and M. Samaritani,GE 2015 - The 47th annual meeting of the Italian Association of Electronics Group (GE Association), Siena, Italy 2015. (Poster presentation)

In-vehicle Embedded Architecture for Estimation of Green Drive Performance

Paranthaman, P.K., Dange, G.R., Bellotti, F., Berta, R., De Gloria, A., GE 2016 - The 48th annual meeting of the Italian Association of Electronics Group (GE Association), Brescia, Italy 2016. (Presentation)

Unifying IoT and serious game concept to foster collaborative and safe driving

P.K. Paranthaman, G.R Dange, F. Bellotti, R. Berta, A. De Gloria" - ACM CHI 2017: workshop on Designing social IoT, Denver, Colorado, USA — May 06 - 11, 2017. (Position Paper)

Presentations

GALA - Games and Learning Alliance Conference - 2015, Rome, Italy

In this conference, I presented my research activity on the integration of serious games in the transportation sector with further explanations of real-time gamification aspects and instantaneous driver evaluation modules.

Applications in Electronics Pervading Industry, Environment and Society - 2016, Rome, Italy

I presented my research activity on serious gaming architecture for promoting green and safe driving behaviors. I discussed the high-level system architecture of a serious gaming framework involved in the context of TEAM (Tomorrow's Elastic Adaptive Mobility) - European Union project.