Engineering Research Equipment: An Advanced Visualization Environment for the Study of Interfacial and Bioengineering Processes

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Research programs in the areas of thermodynamics, biophysics and materials processing make extensive use of interactive computer graphics to help analyze computer simulation data by a visualization of the physical processes at work. Most of the projects use an atomic-level description of the physical system coupled to an appropriate statistical mechanics-based simulation technique (Molecular Dynamics or Monte Carlo) to produce files containing the positions of all the atoms or molecules in the system. These data files are then analyzed using interactive computer graphics. The impact of a computer graphics analysis strongly influences projects such as the design of liquid crystalline polymers, the stability of proteins against denaturation and the design of new materials such as rapidly solidified metal alloys, as described in the proposal. In a number of applications, particularly interfacial phenomena, the ability to make a videotape of the process is invaluable. Interfacial phenomena may involve capillary condensation in pores, membrane fusion or Molecular beam Epitaxy of semiconductor materials, but all profit by the visualization offered by an approximation of real-time motion of the substances under different conditions. High- performance graphics workstations linked to an appropriate video imaging system are used to bring about this visualization.