The Indian Institute of Technology Madras (IIT Madras) and a Japanese firm, Monolith Research And Training Labs will launch an advanced diploma program in Virtual Reality. The programme will be offered in both online and offline mode.
The course, an IIT Madras statement said, would be open for anyone with an engineering background including students currently enrolled in engineering degrees anywhere in India. The applications will be made available from November 2021 and the first batch will start from January 2022. The course will have an annual intake of 50 students, the institute said.
“Virtual reality (VR) is a powerful technology in which the human senses are artificially stimulated. Using computer programs, VR technology allows a user to interact with a computer-simulated environment to experience, feel and touch the images of past, present, and the future,” it added.
The course will be coordinated by IIT Madras' Centre of Excellence on Virtual Reality and Haptics, set up under the ‘Institute of Eminence' initiative of the Government of India.
Highlighting the unique aspects of the program, Professor M Manivannan, Department of Applied Mechanics, IIT Madras, said, “Virtual Reality is inherently a practical and an interdisciplinary course. Offering such an experiential and interdisciplinary course online is quite challenging. Both IIT Madras and Monolith have taken this as a challenge to offer this course for the first time in India.”
The key objective of the programme is to serve the increased needs for professionals who are highly skilled in Virtual Reality, Augmented Reality, Mixed Reality (XR) and Haptics technology. The course is offered as a part of IoE-CoE on VR and Haptics at IITM which is India's first Research and Product Innovation centre for XR and haptics technology, also known as Experiential Technology Innovation Center (XTIC.org), the institute added.
Yathirajan Varadharajan, Director of Monolith said: “Our MoU with IITM strengthens Monolith's vision to create a learning path in emerging technologies and provide visibility to employment opportunities present across the APAC region for its learners.”
Graduates of this course will have potential job opportunities in sectors such as IT Companies, animation industries, architecture, and engineering industries to healthcare and media production. This advanced diploma program shall be available for students/freshers with minimum bachelor's degrees or for working professionals who are aspiring to upskill in immersive technologies, the institute said.
