ASU Next Lab Co-founders Dr. Bea Rodriguez-Fransen and Dan Munnerley were featured as speakers at ASU’s Smart Region Summit on March 4, 2025. Rodriguez-Fransen served on a panel on Indigenous Communities and Social Impact, and Munnerley was a panelist for the Education and Workforce Development stream. Indigenous Communities and Digital Twins: Capacity-Building, Digital Sovereignty &…

ASU Next Lab Co-founder and Director, Dr. Bea Rodriguez-Fransen, was recently invited as a plenary speaker at XR Southern Summit on February 26-27, 2025. Her talk explored how ASU Next Lab anticipates change, empowering the next generation of innovators with future skills and emerging technologies. Hosted by Southern Utah University, the Summit is a national…

Bea Rodriguez-Fransen has always been a forward thinker, driving innovation as the Director of ASU Next Lab and a Senior Global Futures Scholar at the Global Institute of Sustainability and Innovation. Now, she adds another accolade to her impressive career: TED Talk presenter. In her newly released TED Talk, Bea shares her insights on building…

At ASU Next Lab, we’re committed to advancing learning, media, and technology through collaboration and interdisciplinary innovation. Recently, we had the privilege of hosting a group of talented students and faculty from An-Najar National University, located in Nablus, West Bank. This visit was a significant moment of cross-cultural exchange, opening doors to future collaborations and…

The Arizona Water Metaverse project, launched in 2024, leverages EngageVR to create immersive learning experiences focused on water conservation and Arizona’s water scarcity challenges. This initiative offers a metaverse platform for educators and students to develop sustainable water management strategies through virtual simulations.  The Arizona Water Metaverse project leveraged immersive technology to address Arizona’s critical…

The AZ Transmissions project at Arizona State University uses advanced geospatial technology to map and analyze Arizona’s power infrastructure. A team of students and professionals is extracting data from complex PDFs, georeferencing maps, and automating data extraction using GIS software. The goal is to transform static maps of transmission lines and power stations into interactive,…