Project Title:

Infrastructure Development and Planning Project to Explore the Benefits of a Collaborative Virtual Environment in Virginia Universities and Businesses

Virtual reality (VR) is an emerging technology that can significantly benefit many companies in the state of Virginia. This proposal outlines how the University Visualization and Animation Group (UVAG) of the Advanced Communications and Information Technology Center (ACITC) at Virginia Tech, or just simply "VT-CAVE", will work with various academic institutions and industries in Virginia to further define opportunities related to the use of virtual environments (VEs). This will require recommendations on how to further develop existing partnerships and establishing new ones. Preliminary surveys by the VT-CAVE have shown that VEs can benefit industry by: 1) developing a suite of distributed (VE) software tools that enhance collaboration between various academic and Virginia based industries using high speed networks, and

2) work with newly formed Virginia companies such as, Virtual Prototyping & Simulation Technology (VPST), Inc., whose mission is "to give industry, government, and academia tools and training that enable unprecedented speed and success in both core business functions and R&D".

This infrastructure development and planning award will further study these objectives by:

1) creating a pilot project with existing companies who have already made significant investments in the use of VEs,

2) visit key academic institutions and industries in Virginia who have expressed an interest in using VEs, and

3) based on the results of the pilot project and visits, summarize and modify objectives and make recommendations for the creation of a CIT Virtual Environment Center. The last objective was motivated by the State Senate Joint Resolution No. 226 as an emerging asset.

Objectives:

1. Develop a suite of distributed virtual environment (VE) software tools that enhance collaboration between various Virginia based academic and industries using high speed networks.

2. Create a pilot project with VPST and its client, Mainstreets Productions Company (a Virginia based entertainment company), that will demonstrate how an entertainment, marketing or sales company could benefit by using collaborative virtual environment (VE) software.

3. Visit key academic institutions and industries in Virginia who have expressed an interest in using collaborative VE software.

4. Summarize results in objectives 2 & 3 and modify goals for the development of network collaborative VE software targeted in objective 1 and make recommendations for the creation of a CIT Virtual Environment Center as part of Virginia Tech's new UVAG-ACITC.

Recently the VT-CAVE as a partner with the NSF National Computational Science Alliance (NCSA) -- Partner ship in Computational Science Alliance (PACI) created a VE collaborative software tool based on LIMBO a CAVERNsoft tool that allows users with CAVEs, I-Desks, or SGI workstation CAVE-Simulators to create collaborative applications. For example Joan McLain-Kark from the Department Interior Design at Virginia Tech can collaborate with her industry sponsor, a furniture compnay in Virginia, who is running a CAVE-simulator at a remote site while Joan is viewing and manipulating the same VE room design with her sponsor's furniture in the Virginia Tech CAVE. Joan and her remote site sponsor share the same view and hence can collaborate in designing within that space. Each participant is viewed by the other as an "avatar", a graphical representation of a remote site personality, which can be seen as a simple body with an arm and a head with eyes. The simple avatar can move, point, and talk so that each of the participants can participate in a collaborative design environment. Such a collaborative environment has been used by Caterpillar Inc, a NCSA Industrial partner, to include designers at remote international sites in a collaborative design environment. What NCSA has done nationally and internationally Virginia Tech will implement regionally.

The VT-CAVE has already defined two Virginia based companies who wish to explore how to benefit from collaborative VE software tools: 1) Dr. Bert Newmark, M.D., Radiologist at the Montgomery County Hospital in Blacksburg Virginia, who wants to use Crumbs at the VT-CAVE remotely and in collaboration with colleagues at the UVa Medical Center in Charlottesville, and 2) VPST located in Blacksburg Viriginia and Mainstreet Productions Compnay located in Richmond Virginia. The former is already under consideration to be part of the wireless LMDS Virginia Tech project where wireless communications is proposed to be used to transfer MRI and X-Ray CAT scans to the VT-CAVE, and the later is a collaboration between VPST and Mainstreet who both want to use VT-CAVE resources in their development of entertainment products. For the later $10,500 will be used to purchase Alias|Wavefront software from VPST as a demonstration project with Mainstreet Productions in Richmond. This software will be retained by VT-CAVE and will form the basis for collaboration with Mainstreet productions. Other Virginia universities such as Old Dominion University, Virginia Commonwealth University, and William and Mary have expressed a serious interest in developing a relationship with VT-CAVE. Industries such as Newport News Shipyard have also contacted VT-CAVE about future collaborations using collaborative VEs. Significant funds will be used to pay for travel and academic release time by the principal investigator to develop other Virginia based collaborations.

Candidate collaborative VE sites will be chosen based on their commitment to participate with matching funds on future proposals. All interested participants will meet early December and create a draft proposal by consensus that will recommend and outline the formation of a "Distributed Virtual Environment Center (DVEC)". Such a center will require distributions of CIT funds where each remote site will contribute within their area of expertise and Virginia Tech will become an administrative hub in the new ACITC: "The Network is the Center".

Details about the economic impact will be summarized in a collaborative report to CIT after key Virginia Tech universities and industries are defined as a result of this project.