Head-mounted display-based augmented reality for water quality visualisation

Water covers most of the Earth’s surface and is nowhere near a good ecological or recreational state in many areas of the world. Moreover, only a small fraction of the water is potable. As climate change-induced extreme weather events become ever more prevalent, more and more issues arise, such as worsening water quality problems. Therefore, protecting invaluable and useable drinking water is critical. Environmental agencies must continuously check water sources to determine whether they are in a good or healthy state regarding pollutant levels and ecological status. The currently available tools are better suited for stationary laboratory use, and domain specialists lack suitable tools for on-site visualisation and interactive exploration of environmental data. Meanwhile, data collection for laboratory analysis requires substantial time and significant effort. We, therefore, developed an augmented reality system with a Microsoft HoloLens 2 device to explore the visualisation of water quality and status in situ. The developed prototype visualises geo-referenced sensor measurements incorporated into the perspective of the surroundings. Any users interested in water bodies’ conditions can quickly examine and retrieve an overview of water body status using augmented reality and then take necessary steps to address the current situation.