JOHOR BAHRU, Dec 9 — Universiti Teknologi Malaysia (UTM), through the Media and Game Innovation Centre of Excellence (MaGICX) under the Institute of Human Centered Engineering (iHumEn), successfully hosted the 4th International Workshop on Metaverse – Online Global Classroom Series 2025.
The programme was organised as part of a long-standing international academic collaboration involving Kyushu Institute of Technology (Kyutech), Japan; as well as Telkom University and Institut Teknologi Bandung (ITB), Indonesia, reflecting UTM’s continued commitment to advancing borderless and collaborative digital education.
The workshop attracted 65 participants, comprising undergraduate and postgraduate students, academic staff and researchers from the participating institutions. A total of 12 speakers, consisting of researchers and postgraduate students, delivered presentations showcasing their latest research findings, case studies, and conceptual frameworks related to metaverse technologies and immersive digital learning environments.
The programme provided an important platform for scholarly exchange on emerging topics related to metaverse applications in education, software engineering within metaverse environments, virtual learning ecosystems, and future digital education models. Discussions highlighted how immersive and intelligent technologies are increasingly influencing teaching, learning, and research practices across disciplines and geographical boundaries.
The workshop programme featured a diverse and well-structured series of research presentations addressing both theoretical and applied aspects of metaverse technologies. Sessions covered software engineering education in the era of the metaverse, lip-to-speech systems and vocoder architectures, and the design of emotion-aware self-counselling systems for future virtual environments.
Other notable topics included explainable artificial intelligence for healthcare applications, Artificial Intelligence (AI) vulnerability assessment in vision–language models, and biomedical signal analysis using phonocardiogram and electrocardiogram data.
The programme also showcased emerging applications of digital twin technologies in smart urban development, flood risk mitigation, and smart learning systems, alongside studies on motion generation from music, human gesture semantics, and evolving trends in metaverse platforms and virtual experiences.
Collectively, these sessions demonstrated the interdisciplinary breadth and growing impact of metaverse research across education, healthcare, urban planning, and human–computer interaction. This fourth edition of the workshop continued a strong tradition of international academic engagement, following previous successful editions hosted by UTM in 2022, Kyutech in 2023, and Telkom University in 2024.
The rotation of host institutions highlights the strength of the collaboration and the shared vision among partners to foster sustained global cooperation in immersive and digital education.
In the closing session, the Director of the iHumEn, UTM, Prof. Dr. Mohd Shahrizal Sunar, emphasised that the workshop serves as an important academic platform that should be continued in the coming years. He noted that the initiative not only facilitates the sharing of knowledge and expertise, but also creates opportunities for high-impact academic outputs, including joint journal publications and book chapters, as well as the establishment of collaborative research projects and student exchange programmes.
Overall, the international workshop reflects the values of global citizenship, borderless knowledge, and shared innovation, reinforcing UTM’s role as a leading regional hub for metaverse-based learning, research, and innovation.
The recorded session of the programme can be viewed at: https://youtu.be/va1kZAAvv8M
