EAGER International Type II: Synchronized cloud-based collaborative platform

部分1.非技术性预防COVID-19大流行迫使国际合作，作为科学和工程研究和教育的一部分，转向使用Zoom和其他平台进行远程通信。EAGER提案的最终目标是设计、实施和测试一个新颖的、沉浸式的、基于云的平台，该平台将促进研究人员的国际合作，并允许他们交互式地进行远程实验。该平台将使远程参与者沉浸在一个模拟实际设施的整体虚拟环境中，在那里他们可以使用数字设备交互式地进行真实的实验。通过在参与者的设备上同步数字设备和流程，促进了实时团队合作。通过可穿戴智能眼镜整合的增强现实（AR）使合作伙伴能够将联合收割机同步团队工作与异步个人探索相结合。该项目涉及来自墨西哥、澳大利亚、英国、俄罗斯和非洲的外国合作伙伴。来自不同文化、种族、教育和语言背景的美国科学家和学生将与外国同行组成团队，探索试点平台的效率、适用性和可扩展性。该合作最初将涵盖应用X射线衍射方法研究纳米结构和大分子动力学的教育和研究。该材料研究领域是许多其他科学和工程学科和领域的兴趣。设想的想法是在未经测试的概念的早期阶段进行高风险/高回报的探索性工作，因为目前还不存在这样一个平台。如果成功，它将成为远程国际合作的真实的游戏规则改变者，从根本上消除面对面和远程在线合作之间的差异。该平台将视频会议、团体计算机游戏、飞行和比赛模拟器以及增强和混合现实的最先进功能结合到一个系统中。 通过这种方式，国际合作将变得全球化和快速，相关和有意义，高效和可扩展。该项目将创新性地将当前和新兴的电信和计算机技术整合到一个未来的协作平台，其中包含许多创新。 其中最重要的是：（i）通过在他们的设备上同步模拟虚拟过程和数字设备操作，协调来自不同国家的合作伙伴的互动团队合作;（ii）将数字设备与科学/工程建模软件连接起来;（iii）将作为小组成员的同步实验性能与使用增强现实对象的个人探索和技能培训相结合;（iv）将通过智能眼镜提供的交互式增强现实（AR）对象与由基于云的软件对象模拟并呈现在计算机或智能手机屏幕上的相关虚拟过程连接并同步;（v）连接并同步数字和物理设备;（vi）将自动化项目和协作工具/特征与视频会议集成;以及（vii）实时语音翻译。所提出的系统的效率，适用性和可扩展性有助于连接不同文化和教育背景的科学家和学生，并促进他们作为一个团队的工作。项目平台技术具有巨大的潜力，可以极大地改变科学家和工程师在国际上的合作方式，以及学生参与教育和交流项目的方式。该技术和方法是为晶体结构研究这一特定领域开发和测试的，可以很容易地推广和扩展，并应用于几乎所有的科学和工程领域。该奖项反映了NSF的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的知识价值和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

Part 1. Nontechnical descriptionThe COVID-19 pandemic has forced international collaborations, as part of science and engineering research and education, to move to remote communication using Zoom and other platforms. The ultimate goal of this EAGER proposal is to design, implement, and test a novel, immersive, cloud-based platform that will facilitate international collaborations of researchers and allow them to interactively perform remote experiments. The platform will immerse remote participants into a holistic virtual environment imitating an actual facility where they can interactively perform authentic experiments using digital equipment. Real-time teamwork is facilitated by synchronizing digital equipment and processes on participants’ devices. Incorporated augmented reality (AR) through wearable Smart Glasses enables partners to combine synchronous group work with asynchronous individual exploration. The project involves foreign partners from Mexico, Australia, United Kingdom, Russia and Africa.U.S. scientists and students of diverse cultural, ethnical, educational and language backgrounds will work as teams with their foreign counterparts exploring the efficiency, applicability and scalability of the pilot platform. The collaboration will initially cover education and research on applications of X-Ray diffraction methods for studying nanostructures and dynamics of macromolecules. This materials research area is of interest for many other science and engineering disciplines and domains. The envisioned idea represents high risk/high pay-off exploratory work in its early stages on untested concepts as such a platform currently does not exist. Should it succeed it will be a real game-changer in distant international collaboration by essentially lifting the difference between an in-person and remote online collaboration. The platform combines the most advanced features of videoconferencing, group computer games, flight and race simulators, and augmented and mixed reality into a single system. This way, international collaboration will become global and fast, relevant and meaningful, efficient and scalable.Part 2. Technical descriptionThe project will innovatively integrate current and emerging telecommunication and computer technologies into a futuristic collaborative platform that incorporates numerous innovations. The most significant of them are: (i) orchestrating an interactive teamwork of the partners from different countries by synchronizing simulated virtual processes and digital equipment operations on their devices; (ii) connecting digital equipment with science/engineering modeling software; (iii) combining synchronized performance of experiment as a group member with individual exploration and skills training using augmented reality objects; (iv) connecting and synchronizing interactive augmented reality (AR) objects, provided through Smart Glasses, with relevant virtual processes simulated by cloud-based software objects and presented on a computer or smartphone screen; (v) connecting and synchronizing digital and physical equipment; (vi) integrating automated project and collaboration tools/features with video conferencing; and (vii) real-time voice translation. The efficiency, applicability, and scalability of the proposed system is instrumental for connecting scientists and students of different cultural and educational backgrounds, and for facilitating their work as a team. The project platform technology has a great potential to dramatically change the way scientists and engineers collaborate internationally as well as student participate in educational and exchange programs. Being developed and tested for the specific area of studying crystal structures, the technology and approach can be easily generalized and expanded and applied to virtually all science and engineering domains.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.