LabInVirtuo, a Method for Designing, Restoring and Updating Virtual Environments for Science and Technology from Heterogeneous Digital Corpus

This paper introduces LabInVirtuo, a methodological framework for designing Realistic Sensory Intelligent Virtual Environments (RSIVE) dedicated to the preservation, study, and dissemination of scientific, technological, and industrial heritage. The project combines heterogeneous historical sources—such as archival documents, 3D scans, plans, oral testimonies, and semantic ontologies—to reconstruct interactive virtual environments where users can collaboratively explore past industrial settings. The system establishes a bidirectional link between a digital corpus and immersive environments, allowing both consultation and enrichment of knowledge through user interaction. Particular emphasis is placed on embodied experience, multisensory immersion, gesture capture, and conversational agents as tools for eliciting procedural memory and expert know-how. The approach is tested through several French industrial heritage case studies and aims to support research, education, preventive conservation, and public engagement.