Human factors and ergonomics considerations in the industrial metaverse

The industrial metaverse is a new and emerging topic in smart manufacturing, extending the previous Industry 4.0 concept of cyber-physical systems in manufacturing. The trend is in its early phase, and the definition of the concept is still forming. The goal of this paper is to study the industrial metaverse from the human factors and ergonomics (HF/E) point of view to ensure that the related design and development efforts have a holistic approach. Three industrial metaverse work scenarios were created and assessed from the HF/E point of view. Based on the scenario analysis, new opportunities and challenges were identified related to user experience, usability, usefulness, user acceptance, ergonomics, safety and ethics. This paper is one of the first to start the HF/E discussion related to the metaverse, and its findings can be used both by the research community and the industry when stepping into the era of the industrial metaverse.