FluidVis: A Semi-Immersive Visualization Tool for Time-Varying Confocal Microscop

描述(由申请人提供)：我们的长期目标是通过销售交钥匙系统(将我们的软件与商业现成的硬件相结合)提供身临其境的立体体验，使任何研究人员(专家或学生)能够直接查看内在复杂的时变3D共焦数据集并与其交互，以便在科学分析过程中利用直观的感知和运动技能。该项目的总体目标是通过进一步开发我们计划中的软件产品FluidVis的原型，并测试其作为广泛可用的沉浸式可视化工具的可行性，特别是针对时变3D图像，来帮助改进基础生物医学研究，特别是在细胞和发育生物学方面。我们的工具将仿照成熟的研究原型，a)通过四年的研究开发，b)导致传统方法错过的重要发现，c)正式用户研究发现它比传统桌面工具更有效。该模型系统只在一家机构使用，因为它依赖于一个完全沉浸式的“洞穴”显示器，需要花费数百万美元来获得和维护，而且研究软件对用户不够友好，不能用于生产用途。我们的基本方法是用更实用(更便宜和半沉浸式)的显示器取代完全沉浸式的Cave显示器，这种显示器保留了基于Cave的系统的主要优点，但适合在典型的生物实验室中使用。为了实现我们的长远目标，需要进行可行性验证和开发。因此，我们第一阶段项目的中心目的是确定使生物学家在分析时变3D图像时广泛使用经过验证但通常无法访问的新可视化功能(沉浸式立体显示)的可行性。如果第一阶段成功，第二阶段项目的中心目的将是充分指定、实地测试新可视化能力的广泛使用版本，并使其符合商业标准。 公共卫生相关性：该项目中进行的研究将扩展一种新的沉浸式可视化工具(FluidVis)，该工具是对生物学家研究细胞生物学和发育生物学的常用可视化工具的补充。FluidVis目前支持静态数据的可视化，拟议的扩展将使时变数据的数据可视化成为可能。拟议的工作将使研究人员以及学生能够直接查看内在复杂的时变3D图像堆栈并与其交互，以便在科学分析期间利用直观、感知和运动技能。特别是，FluidVis以交互方式渲染用于立体查看的图像堆栈，从而使复杂的空间关系和功能更加直观，并且它提供了易于使用的交互技术，用于操作3D视图、更改渲染参数以及与数据分析小部件交互。我们的目标是使时变共焦数据集的半沉浸式可视化得到广泛的访问。

DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): Our long-term goal is to make available an immersive, stereoscopic experience by selling a turn-key system (combining our software with commercial-off-the-shelf hardware) that enables any investigator (expert or student) to directly view and interact with inherently complex time- varying 3D confocal datasets in order to leverage intuitive perceptual and motor skills during scientific analysis. The overarching goal of this project is to help improve basic biomedical research, especially in cellular and developmental biology, by further developing a prototype of our planned software product, FluidVis, and testing its feasibility as a widely accessible immersive visualization tool specificaly for time-varying 3D imagery. Our tool will be modeled after a proven research prototype that has a) been developed through four years of research, b) led to important discoveries missed by conventional methods, and c) for which formal user studies have found it more effective than conventional desktop tools. The model system is used only at one institution because it depends on a fully-immersive "Cave" display which costs millions of dollars to obtain and maintain, and the research software is not user friendly enough for production use. Our basic approach is to substitute the fully-immersive Cave display with a more practical display (less expensive and semi-immersive) that retains the main benefits of the Cave-based system yet is suitable for use in a typical biology laboratory. To achieve our long-term goal, feasibility testin and development are needed. Thus, the central purpose of our Phase I project is to determine the feasibility of making a proven but generally inaccessible new visualization capability (immersive, stereoscopic display) widely accessible to biologists when analyzing time-varying 3D imagery. If Phase I is successful, the central purpose of Phase II project would be to fully-specify, field-test, and make robust and practical to commercial standards the widely accessible version of the new visualization capability. PUBLIC HEALTH RELEVANCE: The research conducted in this project will extend a new immersive visualization tool (FluidVis) that is complementary to commonly used visualization tools for biologists researching cell biology and developmental biology. FluidVis currently supports visualization of static data and the proposed extension will enable data visualization of time-varying data. The proposed work will enable investigators as well as students to directly view and interact with inherently complex time-varying 3D image stacks in order to leverage intuitive perceptual and motor skills during scientific analysis. In particular, FluidVis interactiely renders image stacks for stereoscopic viewing such that complicated spatial relationships and features are much more immediately apparent, and it provides easy-to-use interaction techniques for manipulating the 3D view, changing rendering parameters, and interacting with data analysis widgets. Our aim is to make semi-immersive visualization of time-varying confocal datasets widely accessible.