Bristol students bring ocean science to life through immersive gaming
Press release issued:6 November 2026
The student-built projects were presented at the 2026 OceanX Summit held aboard the OceanXplorer scientific vessel in Singapore. The event explored how advances in science and technology could help shape the future of our relationship with the ocean.
The projects form part of a collaboration between OceanX Education and The Sheds, the University of Bristol’s digital and creative technology facility. Funded by a philanthropic grant from Dalio Philanthropies, the partnership brings together university researchers, students and Bristol-based creative studios to explore new ways of communicating complex marine science to audiences around the world.
Ocean acidification, rising ocean temperatures and deoxygenation pose major challenges for marine ecosystems. Yet these processes can be difficult to visualise, particularly when their effects unfold over decades or involve microscopic organisms that play a vital role.
A team of current and recent University of Bristol students in Computer Science and Science Communication combined gaming technology and creative storytelling to make these issues more accessible through interactive media. Led by Professor Steve Simpson, Dr Lewis Alcott, Jon Brigden and Mel Garber, the students worked with OceanX scientific data to ensure every experience is informed by accurate marine science.
In Nada & Kai: The Seagrass Quest, participants help restore a fragile seagrass meadow by planting shoots and clearing debris. They can then watch the ecosystem move from decline towards recovery, offering an interactive way to explore the processes involved in restoring an underwater habitat.
Seamount Secrets casts players as detectives investigating why a once-thriving reef has lost its marine life. Using environmental DNA and other ecosystem evidence, players follow an “Investigate, Analyse, Deduce, Reveal” process to uncover what caused the decline, where it began, and what impact it had.
In Data Dive, participants explore a seamount, a steep-sided underwater mountain, using tools available aboard the OceanXplorer. Players can deploy a CTD rosette, a device used to collect water samples and measure ocean conditions, then launch a remotely operated vehicle (ROV) to explore the ocean floor.
For the students involved, the projects offered an opportunity to apply their technical and scientific skills to a global challenge, while exploring how interactive experiences could bring the story of our oceans to new audiences.
Oscar De Mello, Assistant Director at The Sheds, who attended the event, said: “The projects showcased at The OceanX Summit were the culmination of a year’s worth of development led by students, scientists and practitioners across the world. The pieces are all grounded in science but are experienced more like pieces of art that draw you in visually or acoustically and leave you with a key message about ocean conservation. It’s very effective and is making an important contribution to global efforts to raise awareness of ocean conservation.”
Alongside the student work, the University of Bristol coordinated four practitioner-led pieces with Bristol-based creative studios AllSeeingEye and Studio Giggle, commissioned by OceanX Education.
AllSeeingEye presented a new virtual reality piece at the Summit called Traces of the Deep which gave guests an immersive way to experience ocean science first-hand. Developed with the University of Bristol and wildlife filmmaker James Honeyborne, the experience allows audiences to shrink inside a vial of seawater and follow an octopus and sperm whale through a luminous world shaped by the environmental DNA they leave behind. The experience is set to tour in 2027.
Studio Giggle led the delivery of three story-driven OceanX installations at the ArtScience Museum in Singapore, which have been seen by thousands of visitors. DataXplorer, Seagrass Stories, and eDNA Detectives were developed in partnership with the University of Bristol and Honeyborne.
Through a collaboration led by OceanX with Singaporean artist Ong Kian Peng, Honeyborne, and the University of Bristol, eDNA Detectives is an immersive experience which invites visitors to step into the role of marine scientists searching for clues within water samples. Participants collect and analyse eDNA, uncovering which underwater creatures have left their traces in these virtual waters.
Seagrass Stories explores an innovative approach to seagrass restoration inspired by traditional Tunisian fishing traps. The Studio Giggle and University of Bristol teams collaborated with marine ecologist Nada Abdelkader to develop the installation, which invites audiences to use simple gestural control to initiate planting of new seagrass and contribute to the restoration of marine life in the meadows.
DataXplorer presents a visually striking artistic interpretation of data collected by a CTD (Conductivity, Temperature and Depth) instrument, an oceanographic tool that measures how water temperature and salinity change with depth. As visitors approach the data wall, they are invited to embody an ocean current, revealing the hidden life that thrives in the deep.
The Sheds provided facilities including its Reality Emulator , an extended reality suite and large LED displays, enabling researchers, students and creative businesses to develop and test immersive experiences together. Audience testing is also helping researchers understand whether immersive and gamified experiences can influence attitudes towards marine conservation.
Speakers at the Summit discussed topics ranging from marine conservation missions to investment and policy approaches that could support long-term ocean recovery.
Professor Simpson, Head of the School of Biological Sciences at the University of Bristol, spoke about his research in bioacoustics, how the sounds of the ocean reveal the impact of human activity on marine ecosystems, and the ocean’s ability to repair and regenerate when given the space to do so.
Looking ahead, Pui Anantrasirichai, Professor of Visual Computing at the University of Bristol, has worked with OceanX Education and colleagues at the National University of Singapore on a joint technical paper for SIGGRAPH Asia, scheduled for December 2026.
More experimental collaborations and student hackathons are being planned for 2027 between OceanX, the National University of Singapore, The Sheds, and the University of Bristol.
Further information
With thanks to our University of Bristol Students: Alex Bentley, Amicie Lavault, Anni Liu, Ava Raisian, Frederick Zou, Harry Hebbar, Henry Court, Jacob Connor, Kangrui Wang, Kieren Reynolds, Piotr Francik, and Selen Sengul.
And our key OceanX Collaborators: Kay Vasey, Lionel Taillens, and Rahul Nath.
