MRI-R2: Development of an Immersive Giga-pixel Display

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"This award is funded under the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 (Public Law 111-5)." Proposal #: 09-59979PI(s): Kaufman, Arie E., Mueller, Klaus, Qin, Hong, Samaras, Dimitrios, Varshney, AmitabhInstitution: SUNY at Stony BrookTitle: MRI-R2: Development of an Immersive Giga-pixel DisplayProject Proposed: This project, developing a next generation of immersive display instrument (called 'Reality Deck'), aims to explore and visualize data from many fields. To satisfy the need driven by the explosive growth of data size and environments already at the institution, the work builds on the existing experience with immersive environments (e.g., the 'Immersive Cabin' a current generation device using projectors). This unique project generates a one-of-a-kind exploration theater, using 308 high-resolution 30 LCD display monitors, by contributing an environment whose visual resolution is at the limit of the human eye's acuity. Within this environment investigators can interact with the data/information displayed. The instrument services many groups, including visual computing, virtual and augmented reality, human computer interfaces, computer vision and image processing, data mining, physics, scientific computing, chemistry, marine and atmospheric sciences, climate and weather modeling, material science, etc.Collaborating scientist's applications will be ported to the RealityDeck, including applications in nanoelectronics, climate and weather modeling, biotoxin simulations, microtomography, astronomy, atmospheric science, G-pixel camera for intelligence gathering, architectural design and disaster simulations, smart energy grid, and many others.A unique assembly of displays, GPU cluster, sensors, communication/networking, computer vision and human computer interaction technologies, RealityDeck is an engineering feat with user studies to deliver a holistic system with a significant societal and research value. It is a one-of-a-kind pioneering G-pixel display approaching the limits of visual cognition that provides functionalities to a diverse user base. Its resolution at the eye's visual acuity and its field of view will always exceed that of a human user (wherever a human chooses to look), satisfying visual queries into the data in a very intuitive way. This visual interaction is tightly coupled with physical navigation.This surround virtual environment consists of inertial sensors and six cameras mounted around the top corners of the RealityDeck room to allow interaction with the displays. The display system is driven by a cluster of about 80 high-end computer nodes, each equipped with two high end GPUs. A small-scale video-wall has already been constructed as an experimental platform for the RealityDeck consisting of 9 high-resolution 30 LCD panels in a 3×3 configuration. Broader Impacts: The instrument will be used for research, education, and outreach across many departments at the institution, the University of Maryland, and Brookhaven National Laboratory (BNL). It fosters collaborations across disciplines attracting faculty, researchers, and students. RealityDeck significantly enriches the quality of visual thinking and data exploration. It substantially enhances the infrastructure of research and education and has the potential to alter the way computer graphicists, engineers, and scientists work and/or conduct scientific discoveries.