Vetaverse: Technologies, Applications, and Visions toward the Intersection of Metaverse, AI, Vehicles, and Transportation Systems

Since 2021, the term “Metaverse” has been the most popular, garnering much interest. Due to its contained environment and built-in computing and networking capabilities, a modern car makes an intriguing location to host its own little metaverse. Also, travelers don’t have much to do to pass the time while traveling, making them ideal customers for immersive services. Metaverseerse is envisioned as a blended immersive realm that scales to cities and countries, as digital twins of the intelligent Transportation Systems, referred to as “TS-Metaverse”, as well as customized XR services inside each Individual Vehicle, referred to as “IV-Metaverse”. The two subcategories serve fundamentally different purposes, namely longterm interconnection, maintenance, monitoring, and management on scale for large transportation systems (TS), and personalized, private, and immersive infotainment services (IV). By outlining the framework of Vetaverse and examining important AI and facilitating technologies, we reveal this impending trend. Lastly, we examine unresolved issues and potential routes for future study while highlighting some intriguing Vetaverse services.