Principle Investigator:  Nancy N. Soreide

Line Organization: OAR/PMEL
Routing Code: R/E/PM
Address:
                  NOAA/PMEL/OD
                  7600 Sand Point Wy NE
                  Seattle, WA 98115

Phone: (206) 526-6728
Fax: (206) 526-4576
E-mail Address: nns@pmel.noaa.gov

Co-Investigators:
 

Christopher Moore	Glenn Wheless	Cathy Lascara
cmoore@pmel.noaa.gov	wheless@ccpo.odu.edu	lascara@ccpo.odu.edu

 

Proposal Theme: Next Generation Internet and Enabling Applications

Funding Summary:    FY 2000 $155,500
 
 
 
 

___________________________	___________________________	_____________________________
Nancy N. Soreide Associate Director for Info Tech	Cynthia L. Loitsch,  Program Support Officer	Eddie Bernard Director
Pacific Marine Environmental Laboratory	Pacific Marine Environmental Laboratory	Pacific Marine Environmental Laboratory

 

Executive Summary:

NOAA's environmental data sets (observations and model output) are becoming increasingly large, more complex, and geographically distributed across heterogeneous computing platforms. An improved understanding of this information depends upon the successful integration of the data sets with new visualization and analysis technologies. Interactive and immersive visualisation tools are becoming an integral part of the scientific process, because they provide unprecedented power to explore data sets and to communicate what we learn in very new ways. The impact of virtual environments in science, education, and training is dramatically increased if the experience can be shared with others.

Defined as a key enabling technology by the Next Generation Internet (NGI) project, collaborative virtual environments (CVEs) allow multiple participants to collaborate using high-speed networks connecting heterogeneous computing resources and large data stores. As such, CVEs extend the human/computer paradigm to include human/computer/human collaborations. The CVEs being developed today are prototyping the information infrastructure of the next century in terms of advanced networking, virtual reality, high performance computing, data mining, and human/computer interactions.

The goal of this proposal is to establish a collaborative virtual environment at the NOAA/PMEL facility. This testbed will be comprised of virtual reality hardware, a collaborative software application, and an NGI network connection. The testbed will allow application scientists at NOAA to:

     explore datasets using interactive and immersive visualization tools
     share data, analyses, and interpretations using a distributed collaborative framework
     participate in testing/evaluation of the NGI
     participate in the definition and design of tomorrow's computational infrastructure

This project is primarily an integration effort. The proposed virtual reality hardware uses mature projection and tracking technology. This type of immersive hardware has been in existence since 1992 and in 1998 there were over 80 CAVE and ImmersaDesk installations around the world (and an estimated 200 today). The collaborative software environment that will be used in this project is an extension of an existing virtual reality scientific tool known as Cave5D which has been integrated with the CAVERNsoft toolkit to implement a distributed collaborative framework. A working prototype of collaborative Cave5D has been demonstrated at the NGI April workshop, the Internet2 April workshop, and Alliance'98.

Problem Statement:

Problem Statement:  As computational power increases, and observation systems sample the environment more densely in space and time, data sets have become increasingly large and more complex. Model data is generated at remote supercomputing centers and observational data are available in near real-time over high bandwidth networks. Immersive virtual environments are playing a transforming role in scientific experimentation, and an increasingly important role in education and training. Virtual reality allows the user to view, navigate, and interact with multidimensional fields providing unparalleled insights into process that might otherwise be impossible. Collaborative virtual environments (sometimes referred to as tele-immersion) allow users to interact with the virtual world and with other users in a shared environment.

Several premier NOAA research laboratories are responsible for collecting and disseminating complex environmental data sets as well as utilizing remote, distributed supercomputer centers for computer model analyses. PMEL has acquired the hardware (ImmersaDesk/SGI), and has a proven track record for successful application of state-of-the-art technology.    In this proposal we request the funds required to enable us to utilize these new immersive Virtual Reality technologies, to integrate  collaborative applications using the Next Generation Internet (NGI), and to transport the ImmersaDesk to scientific and  professional society meetings for to demonstrate NOAA applications of this new technology.

Relationship to NOAA HPCC objectives: This project directly addresses the HPCC themes focused on development of NGI and collaborative, visualization and analysis tools and enabling applications. It utilizes state-of-the-art, high-speed technology and pushes the envelope for NOAA, and indeed, in the oceanographic community. Immersion techniques allow scientists to interact with large, complex datasets by entering them, in a virtual sense. Users of immersion technology affirm that no other techniques provide a similar sense of presence and insight into their datasets. The integration of CAVE5D software with the CAVERNsoft toolkit makes this technology a collaborative one.

A successful demonstration of Virtual Reality immersive technologies with NOAA datasets will be widely recognized within as well as outside NOAA, and PMEL's history of successful collaboration with the NOAA data centers and other research laboratories is a strong indicator of how widely this project will impact Line Offices throughout NOAA. PMEL's proven track record for successful assimilation of new technology combine with Drs. Wheless and Lascara's very substantial reputation in virtual reality applications, to yield an excellent cost/benefit ratio for this proposal. With the recently aquired availability of high speed (NGI) network capabilities at NOAA's Western Region, dynamic user interaction with remotely distributed datasets generated by models running on supercomputers, as well as large datasets held by data centers and centers of data, will be possible utilizing this same technology.

A primary focus of federally funded Computational Infrastructure programs is that application scientists should drive the development of a usable computing environment, ie. the process should not be technology driven. The application scientists at NOAA/PMEL represent an un-tapped community of users that should be included in this process. As part of this feedback process, the CVE testbed proposed here will leverage the emerging technology activities of several research and academic institutions for the direct benefit of
NOAA scientists.

Proposed Solution:

Synopsis of Proposed Solution: We propose to establish a collaborative virtual environment (CVE) at the NOAA/PMEL facility. This laboratory has responsibility for several critical NOAA data sets, including El Nino observations and model analyses, inter-disciplinary Fisheries Oceanography observations and model outputs, sea floor hydrothermal venting, and tsunami hazard mitigation observations and models. PMEL scientists utilize the Maui Supercomputer Center, which has recently acquired an NGI connection. Community modeling efforts are being initiated by both the Fisheries Oceanography and Tsunami projects. PMEL is clearly well poised make good use of the proposed tele-immersion technology. In addition, other organizations on the NOAA Western Region Campus are also expressing interest in tele-immersion. These include meteorologists in the NWS, and strong interest by Fisheries biologiests and modelers in the NMFS. NOS/Hazmat is presently using 2D models, but anticipating the use of 3D models, and wants to stay in touch with the project.  Under tthis proposalcollaborations between NOAA scientists in the Western Region and academia would be strengthened and facilitated by the availability of immersive, collaborative virtual environments.

Software will be integrated with the recently acquired ImmersaDesk hardware to create a collaborative application that will utilize PMEL's NGI connection to link with other sites running the application. The application, collaborative Cave5D, is publically available to NOAA from the Center for Coastal Physical Oceanography at Old Dominion University.  In this effort, we are proposing to use advanced but proven software and hardware technologies.

Hardware:  The Immersadesk is a drafting-table format, projection-based virtual prototyping device which uses stereo glasses and sonic head/hand tracking to offer a type of virtual reality that is semi-immersive. These devices provide the graphical illusion of being in a three-dimensional space by displaying visual output in stereo and in a three-dimensional perspective according to head position, and by allowing navigation through the space. The CAVE user interface software library has all the functions necessary to create a CAVE program including the synchronization of the CAVE devices, walls, calculations of stereo transformations, and many other CAVE-specific tasks. The ability provided by such systems to navigate through our virtual environments and view the data from different vantage points greatly increases the ability to perform analysis of scientific data.  The ImmersaDesk and Silicon Graphics Onyx2 graphics engine have already been acquired.

Cave5D:  Cave5D, co-developed by PIs Wheless and Lascara from ODU and Dr. Bill Hibbard from the University of Wisconsin Madison, is a configurable virtual reality application framework. Cave5D is supported by Vis5D (http://www.ssec.wisc.edu/~billh), a very powerful graphics API that provides visualization techniques to display multi-dimensional numerical data from atmospheric, oceanographic, and other similar models, including isosurfaces, contour slices, volume visualization, wind/trajectory vectors, and various image projection formats. The figures at http://ccpo.odu.edu/~ramey/for_al.html show Cave5D being used to view results from a Fisheries Oceanography numerical model of circulation in the Bering Sea. The Cave5D framework integrates the CAVE VR software libraries (http://www.ncsa.uiuc.edu/VR/cavernus/) and the Vis5D API in order to visualize numerical data in the Vis5D file format on the ImmersaDesk or CAVE and enables user interaction with the data. The Vis5D file format consists of a three-dimensional spatial grid of dependent multivariate data that evolves over time. PMEL scientists have already begun using the Vis5D software to visualize multi-dimensional datasets and model outputs. Cave5D has been demonstrated at both recent Internet2 members meetings and at the Next Generation Internet (NGI) meeting held in Washington, DC, March 1998. Cave5D is currently distributed and supported at the ODU Virtual Environments Lab website (
http://www.ccpo.odu.edu/~cave5d).

Collaborative Cave5D:  Newer versions of the Cave5D application are capable of being used in a fully networked mode, thus providing a powerful remote collaboration technology. Remote interaction is enabled by transmitting networked tracker data, voice, video, and navigation information, thereby enabling scientists to collaboratively work with other scientists or visualization professionals using Cave5D at other locations.

VRML:  We will explore the feasibility and  utility of a VRML browser for the ImmersaDesk (http://www.evl.uic.edu/swami/cave6u/).

Leveraging and Matching:  We are leveraging very heavily from expertise and experience of our ODU co-investigators, and anticipate that we will benefit greatly from the use of software developed at ODU for the ImmersaDesk.  PMEL is contributing 2 months of PI salary, and is providing all infrastructure and system support for the ImmersaDesk and SGI graphics engine hardware and operating system software.  Individual projects, who utilize the ImmersaDesk, at PMEL and elsewhere, will contribute their time and expertise.  The exploration of browsing VRML on the ImmersaDesk will leverage heavily from previous and current HPCC supported VRML efforts.

Analysis:

Defined as a key enabling technology by the Next Generation Internet (NGI) project, collaborative virtual environments (CVEs) allow multiple participants to collaborate using high-speed networks connecting heterogeneous computing resources and large data stores. As such, CVEs extend the human/computer paradigm to include human/computer/human collaborations. The CVEs being developed today are prototyping the information infrastructure of the next century in terms of advanced networking, virtual reality, high performance computing, data mining, and human/computer interactions.

Considerably more portable and less expensive, than the CAVE, the ImmersaDesk is a drafting table format virtual prototyping device with a computer operated audio system. Using stereo glasses and magnetic head and hand tracking, this projection-based system offers a type of virtual reality that is semi-immersive. Rather than surrounding the user with graphics and blocking out the real world, the ImmersaDesk features a 4x5-foot rear-projected screen at a 45-degree angle.  The ImmersaDesk model R2, which has been acquired by PMEL, is a roadworthy (air cargo qualified) version of the ImmersaDesk. With the press of a button, this 'Desk will  instantly transform to vertical screen position for use as a traditional rear projection display. This self-contained flight case features a rapidly deployable rear projection  system optimized as a sloped screen Spatially Immersive Display [SID] and includes on board tracking, audio and input device equipment.

Although other manufacturers produce immersion virtual reality devices, the ImmersaDesk was chosen because it is built to be portable, low cost (relatively speaking), widely deployed (relatively speaking), and mirrors the equipment at ODU.  PMEL intends to utilize heavily the technologies, software, and expertise at ODU, in order to make the best possible use of NOAA's first ImmersaDesk deployment. Although there is no current, master list, the educated estimate of our co-investigators is that approximatly 200 ImmersaDesks and CAVEs are deployed throughout the world, not including similar immersion devices being produced by other manufacturers (e.g., MechDyne, TAN, FAKESPACE, etc.).

Performance Measures, Milestones and Deliverables:

Milestones
 

Put TAO, Fishereies Oceanography, Tsunami, and hydrothermal venting data/model outputs on ImmersaDesk	6 months
Demonstrate collaborative use of ImmersaDesk	12 months
Demonstration/presentation of the efforts at major meetings (AMS, AGU, etc.)	12 months
Release Web Pages describing our work	12 months
Virtual Environments will be created from NOAA data and  include 1) El Nino model analyses, 2) Fisheries-Oceanography  models in the Gulf of Alaska and the Bering Sea, and 3) models  of the plumes created during venting of submarine volcanos  along seafloor spreading, and other data sets held by interested scientists.	12 months

Deliverables:  At the end of this project, we will have successfully developed NGI applications with oceanographic and/or meteorological data, and we will have expanded expertise in immersive virtual reality applications within NOAA. We believe that these demonstrations will illuminate the feasibility and utility of immersive Virtual Reality applications within NOAA, and will be invaluable to other line offices and in other disciplines. The expertise to utilize immersion technology will then be available within the NOAA community.

We will utilize Cave5d on the newly purchased PMEL ImmersaDesk to interact with a virtual environment created from NOAA's ENSO data from the TAO network of buoys in the Tropical Pacific. Other datasets will be included in the first year as resources allow; candidates include El Nino model analyses, Fisheries-Oceanography models in the Gulf of Alaska and the Bering Sea, models of the plumes created during venting of submarine volcanos along seafloor spreading, and tsunami modeling outputs.  Wheless's work with the Chesapeake Bay and with the NOAA-funded South Atlantic Bight Recruitment Experiment (SABRE), will dovetail well with multi-disciplinary projects within PMEL, such as Fisheries-Oceanography in the Bering Sea and deep ocean sea-floor venting studies.  The NOAA Western Regional Campus includes OAR, NWS, NMFS and NESDIS, and under this proposal, we will support the use of the ImmersaDesk by these organizations.

We will explore and demonstrate collaborative use of the ImmersaDesk, and testbed the Quality of Services required for realistic performance over the NGI.  This will be done initially between NGI partners NOAA/PMEL and ODU, and expanded to other NGI partners as the opportunity arises.   The results of this NOAA testbed project exploring the use of immersion technology will be presented jointly by the principal investigators, and the ImmersaDesk will be demonstrated at scientific and professional society meetings (e.g., AGU Ocean Sciences, AMS, SuperComputing, etc.). Web pages will describe our experiences with immersion technology, so that others inside and outside NOAA can benefit from that experience.

In subsequent years, potential applications of ImmersaDesk technology utilizing the NGI include computational steering of models running on remote supercomputers, ImmersaDesk to ImmersaDesk collaborations, and ImmersaDesk access to remotely distributed datasets.

Budget Summary:

Provide a summary of the proposed budget.
 

Category	Description	Amount
		FY 2000
Personnel Compensation	Soreide 2 month PMEL/JISAO 12 months	$0 $75,000
Contracts or Services	ODU Wheless 1 month ODU Lascara 1 month ODU Programmer 6 mos	$12,000 $12,000 45,000
Rent, Communications, Utilities	ODU computer services costs	$1,500
Capital Expenses		$0
Supplies and Materials	expendible items shipping box for SGI	$1,000
Training/Travel	1 person ODU to PMEL 2 people to AGU 2 people to AMS 1 person PMEL to ODU	$6,000
Other	Shipping IDesk to AGU Shipping IDesk to AMS Shipping IDesk to SC	$3,000
		_________
Total Requested:		$155,500

 

Administrative Officer:  Cindy Loitsch
Phone:  (206)526-6236
E-mail Address:  loitsch@pmel.noaa.gov
FMC Number:  940