Making Augmented Reality Safer: Maria Gorlatova Wins DARPA Director’s Fellowship

Augmented reality (AR) systems are poised to assist both everyday use and national defense—helping soldiers navigate complex environments, repair equipment and access critical information in real time. Yet these same systems can also introduce new risks, including distraction, confusion or manipulation by malicious actors.

Maria Gorlatova, associate professor of electrical and computer engineering at Duke, leads pioneering research to make AR technology safer and more reliable in high‑stakes settings. She previously received a two‑year Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) Young Faculty Award, a highly competitive program that supports rising academic researchers developing innovative solutions to national security challenges. That recognition has now expanded with a DARPA Director’s Fellowship, funding a third year to advance her team’s work protecting users from potential risks of AR.

Her lab studies how virtual information shapes human attention, develops methods to detect when AR content blocks or distorts real‑world views, and designs defenses that reveal or neutralize dangerous overlays before users are misled.

A new video from Duke Engineering highlights Gorlatova’s research and the real‑world scenarios her lab is tackling, from using AR to assist in lifesaving training to defending soldiers against deceptive virtual cues in the field.