HCC: Medium: Collaborative Research: Low Cost, Portable, Multi-User, Immersive Virtual Environment Systems for Education and Training in Worlds of Unlimited Size

HCC：中：协作研究：低成本、便携式、多用户、沉浸式虚拟环境系统，用于无限大小世界中的教育和培训

• 批准号: 0964324
• 负责人: Eric Bachmann
• 金额: $ 65.9万
• 依托单位: Miami University
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 项目类别: Continuing Grant
• 财政年份: 2010
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2010-04-15 至 2015-03-31
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=0964324&HistoricalAwards=false
• 关键词: HCC; Medium; Collaborative; Research; Low

In recent years immersive real-time interactive 3D computer environments (virtual reality or VR) have become an invaluable tool for research and development, training, healthcare, commerce, communication, and education, as well as a medium for entertainment. Yet, in general, the use of current VR systems requires travel to specialized facilities in which a sophisticated infrastructure has been pre-installed at great expense. Furthermore, although fully immersive systems that allow teams of users to concurrently explore a simulated environment by walking, turning, and looking around in a natural manner are particularly useful because they provide increased realism through multisensory stimulation, current VR facilities often support only one user at a time who is constrained to explore the virtual world by means of an artificial interface or a movement metaphor that is arbitrary and awkward (e.g., treadmills or walking in place). For most people, the benefits of VR are thus relatively inaccessible and fall quite short of their promise. In this collaborative effort between Miami University and the Naval Postgraduate School, the PIs will conduct research whose goal is to develop an innovative immersive VR system that is completely portable, that will allow multiple users to be immersed simultaneously, and that can be used in any large indoor or outdoor area such as a gymnasium or parking lot. Users will be able to walk naturally for miles in a virtual world without ever becoming aware of the physical limits of the tracking space or the locations of other users. A system capable of immersing a single user will cost an order of magnitude less than current systems. To these ends the PIs will exploit two emerging techniques: redirected walking, an algorithm that imperceptibly steers users away from obstacles such as walls and which the PIs have previously shown can, given a physical area of sufficient size, enable users to navigate through a virtual world of unlimited size in a natural manner without encountering real-world boundaries and obstacles; and self contained inertial position tracking, which prior research has shown can be used to accurately monitor and track the position and orientation of the user's viewpoint in space without the need for pre-installed permanent infrastructure. In addition, the PIs will integrate into the new VR technology ultrasonic mapping and positioning, a technique commonly used in robotics to provide estimates of absolute position. Broader Impacts: By creating VR systems that are portable and relatively inexpensive, this research will take significant steps toward making VR technology available to a much broader range of people than has heretofore been possible, providing first-hand exposure to cutting-edge concepts and models in science and technology to any population that educators or researchers chose. In particular, the work will enable students at any grade level to experience computer simulations and models by walking within them, instead of by reading about them or by viewing them as an outside observer. The synthesis of redirected walking and self-contained inertial position tracking will offer rich research potential in the computer and behavioral sciences. Implementing relative position tracking through inertial sensors and periodic position fixes instantiates a biologically plausible model of navigation and can parallel research on how humans and other animals find their way through environments.

近年来，沉浸式实时交互式3D计算机环境（虚拟现实或VR）已成为研究和开发，培训，医疗保健，商业，通信和教育的宝贵工具，以及娱乐媒介。 然而，一般来说，使用当前的VR系统需要前往专门的设施，其中预先安装了复杂的基础设施，费用高昂。 此外，尽管允许用户团队通过以自然的方式行走、转弯和环顾四周来同时探索模拟环境的完全沉浸式系统特别有用，因为它们通过多感官刺激提供了增加的真实感，当前的虚拟现实设备通常一次只支持一个用户，该用户被限制为通过人工界面或任意的运动隐喻来探索虚拟世界并且笨拙（例如，在原地踏步或行走）。 因此，对于大多数人来说，VR的好处相对难以获得，并且远远达不到他们的承诺。 在迈阿密大学和海军研究生院之间的合作中，PI将进行研究，其目标是开发一种创新的沉浸式VR系统，该系统完全便携，允许多个用户同时沉浸，并且可以在任何大型室内或室外区域（如体育馆或停车场）使用。 用户将能够在虚拟世界中自然行走数英里，而不会意识到跟踪空间的物理限制或其他用户的位置。 一个能够让单个用户沉浸其中的系统的成本将比目前的系统低一个数量级。 为此，PI将利用两种新兴技术：重定向行走，一种不知不觉地引导用户远离墙壁等障碍物的算法，PI之前已经表明，在给定足够大的物理区域的情况下，用户可以以自然的方式在无限大的虚拟世界中导航，而不会遇到现实世界的边界和障碍物;以及自包含的惯性位置跟踪，先前的研究已经表明，其可以用于精确地监视和跟踪用户视点在空间中的位置和取向，而不需要预先安装的永久性基础设施。 此外，PI将整合到新的VR技术超声映射和定位中，这是机器人技术中常用的一种技术，用于提供绝对位置的估计。更广泛的影响：通过创建便携式且相对便宜的VR系统，这项研究将朝着使VR技术可用于比迄今为止更广泛的人群迈出重要的一步，为教育工作者或研究人员选择的任何人群提供第一手的科学技术前沿概念和模型。 特别是，这项工作将使任何年级的学生都能通过在其中行走来体验计算机模拟和模型，而不是通过阅读或将其视为外部观察者。 重定向步行和独立惯性位置跟踪的综合将在计算机和行为科学中提供丰富的研究潜力。 通过惯性传感器和周期性定位来实现相对位置跟踪，可以实例化一个生物学上合理的导航模型，并可以并行研究人类和其他动物如何在环境中找到自己的路。