Biography and education
Isayas Berhe Adhanom is an Assistant Professor of Computer Science at Texas State University. His research advances Virtual and Augmented Reality (VR/AR) systems by investigating the technical challenges and human-centered factors that shape their usability, accessibility, and overall effectiveness. His work draws on Human-Computer Interaction, Computer Graphics, Artificial Intelligence, and Cognitive Neuroscience to develop more intuitive and impactful immersive technologies. Beyond his research, Dr. Adhanom is deeply involved in service to the VR/AR community. He has held leadership roles as co-chair for major international conferences, including IEEE VR and ACM VRST, and has served on program committees for IEEE VR, IEEE ISMAR, ACM VRST, ACM SUI, and ISVC.
Prior to joining Texas State University, Dr. Adhanom was a President’s Postdoctoral Fellow in the Illusioneering Lab at the University of Minnesota under the mentorship of Dr. Evan Suma Rosenberg. He earned his Ph.D. in Computer Science and Engineering from the University of Nevada, Reno, where he was advised by Eelke Folmer and Paul MacNeilage. Dr. Adhanom’s accomplishments have been recognized with several awards, including a Best Paper Award at IEEE VR, the CSE Outstanding Dissertation Award and the Graduate Dean’s Fellowship at the University of Nevada, Reno, and the President’s Postdoctoral Fellowship at the University of Minnesota.
Prior to joining Texas State University, Dr. Adhanom was a President’s Postdoctoral Fellow in the Illusioneering Lab at the University of Minnesota under the mentorship of Dr. Evan Suma Rosenberg. He earned his Ph.D. in Computer Science and Engineering from the University of Nevada, Reno, where he was advised by Eelke Folmer and Paul MacNeilage. Dr. Adhanom’s accomplishments have been recognized with several awards, including a Best Paper Award at IEEE VR, the CSE Outstanding Dissertation Award and the Graduate Dean’s Fellowship at the University of Nevada, Reno, and the President’s Postdoctoral Fellowship at the University of Minnesota.
Teaching Interests
Research Interests
Featured grants
- Adhanom, Isayas B. Unity3D Faculty Innovation Grant, Texas State University, $1500. (Funded: November 2025 - December 2026). Grant.

Featured scholarly/creative works
- Adhanom, I. B., MacNeilage, P., & Folmer, E. (2023). Eye tracking in virtual reality: a broad review of applications and challenges. Virtual Reality, 27(2), 1481--1505.
- Adhanom, I. B., Halow, S., Folmer, E., & MacNeilage, P. (2022). VR sickness adaptation with ramped optic flow transfers from abstract to realistic environments. Frontiers in Virtual Reality, 3, 848001.
- Adhanom, I. B., Al-Zayer, M., Macneilage, P., & Folmer, E. (2021). Field-of-view restriction to reduce VR sickness does not impede spatial learning in women. ACM Transactions on Applied Perception (TAP), 18(2), 1--17.
- Adhanom, I., Lee, S. C., Folmer, E., & MacNeilage, P. (2020). GazeMetrics: An Open-Source Tool for Measuring the Data Quality of HMD-based Eye Trackers. In In Symposium on Eye Tracking Research and Applications (ETRA ’20).
- Adhanom, I. B., Griffin, N. N., MacNeilage, P., & Folmer, E. (2020). The effect of a foveated field-of-view restrictor on VR sickness. In 2020 IEEE conference on virtual reality and 3D user interfaces (VR) (pp. 645--652).
Featured awards
- Award / Honor Recipient: Best Paper Award, IEEE VR. March 10, 2025 - Present
- Award / Honor Recipient: IEEE VR 2022 IDA Scholarship, IEEE Conference on Virtual Reality and 3D User Interfaces (VR). 2022 - Present
- Award / Honor Recipient: Outstanding Ph.D. Dissertation Award, Department of Computer Science and Engineering, University of Nevada, Reno. 2022
- Award / Honor Recipient: Special Recognitions for Outstanding Review, ACM Symposium on Virtual Reality Software and Technology (VRST 22). 2022
- Award / Honor Recipient: Graduate Student Association Travel Award, University of Nevada, Reno. 2020

Featured service activities
- Member
VERA (Virtual Experience Research Accelerator) Participant and Researcher Committee
- Co-Chair
IEEE VR
- Co-Chair
IEEE VR Workshop on Immersive Sickness Prevention (WISP 25)
- Reviewer / Referee
IEEE Transactions on Visualization and Computer Graphics (TVCG)
- Reviewer / Referee
ACM Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems (CHI)
- Reviewer / Referee
IEEE Conference on Virtual Reality and 3D User Interfaces (IEEE VR)
