Tjasa Savoric: 
Immersive art & XR for human wellbeing in space

Tjasa Savoric is a full-time PhD researcher at Deakin University (Australia) and Coventry University (UK), working at the intersection of extended reality (XR), psychology, and art history. Her research examines how virtual reality can mitigate stress and anxiety in isolated and confined environments, from intensive care units to analogue astronaut missions and, ultimately, long-duration spaceflight.

Drawing on human-centred design and her background in the arts, Tjasa works closely with potential users, subject-matter experts, and stakeholders to create meaningful and culturally sensitive VR experiences. Her recent work includes a gamified, art-based VR concept co-developed by VRmadillo, designed to support mental health and emotional resilience for people living and working in isolation.

Tjasa’s journey combines a passion for immersive technology with a commitment to real-world impact. She is particularly interested in how interdisciplinary research – spanning design, medicine, psychology, space studies, and the humanities – can help humans survive and psychologically thrive in future lunar and Martian habitats.

Tjasa’s gSPARK orientation: Gamified art-based virtual reality for mental health in isolated space environments

With support from her host PhD institutions and Knowledge Angels, Tjasa aims to translate her research into practical tools and methods to assist astronauts, analogue crews, and other isolated communities. Her project focuses on:

• Understanding key psychological stressors in isolated and confined environments – such as sensory monotony, confinement, social deprivation, disrupted sleep, and distance from Earth – and how these manifest over time.

• Co-designing and testing VR experiences that integrate art, narrative, and game mechanics to reduce stress, anxiety, and feelings of isolation.

• Exploring how personalisation and cultural sensitivity in VR content can strengthen a sense of identity, connection, and dignity for people far from home, including future planetary settlers.

• Mapping pathways to deploy these solutions in research settings, healthcare, aged care, analogue missions, and space agencies.

How we support Tjasa:

Tjasa is using her host PhD institutions and Knowledge Angels networks as a gateway into the global community working on space, society, and human factors. We help her to:

• Identify which professional and academic resources, symposia, technical sessions, and side events best align with her focus on XR, mental health, human-centred design, and arts in space, including space psychology, space and society, XR for training and operations, and culture in space.

• Connect with space psychologists, mission planners, XR developers, analogue mission organisers, healthcare innovators, and art-in-space initiatives who can challenge her ideas and create opportunities for collaboration.

• Explore start-up and innovation opportunities and events to assess how research like hers could translate into new services, digital health products, or partnerships with space and medical organisations.

• Transform conference insights and contacts into concrete next steps: collaborative studies, experiment proposals for analogue missions, VR pilot projects with hospitals or space agencies, and contributions to international guidelines on psychological countermeasures.

Through the gSPARK stream of our support, Tjasa is advancing state-of-the-art research in immersive psychological countermeasures and learning to act as a bridge between disciplines and sectors, helping to shape a future in which humans can live, work, and create – mentally healthy and culturally connected – far beyond Earth.