Virtual reality
hideVirtual reality (VR) is a technology which allows a user to interact with a computer-simulated environment, whether that environment is a simulation of the real world or an imaginary world. Most current virtual reality environments are primarily visual experiences, displayed either on a computer screen or through special or stereoscopic displays, but some simulations include additional sensory information, such as sound through speakers or headphones. Some advanced, haptic systems now include tactile information, generally known as force feedback, in medical and gaming applications. Users can interact with a virtual environment or a virtual artifact (VA) either through the use of standard input devices such as a keyboard and mouse, or through multimodal devices such as a wired glove, the Polhemus boom arm, and omnidirectional treadmill. The simulated environment can be similar to the real world, for example, simulations for pilot or combat training, or it can differ significantly from reality, as in VR games. In practice, it is currently very difficult to create a high-fidelity virtual reality experience, due largely to technical limitations on processing power, image resolution and communication bandwidth. However, those limitations are expected to eventually be overcome as processor, imaging and data communication technologies become more powerful and cost-effective over time.
Virtual Reality is often used to describe a wide variety of applications, commonly associated with its immersive, highly visual, 3D environments. The development of CAD software, graphics hardware acceleration, head mounted displays, database gloves and miniaturization have helped popularize the notion. In the book The Metaphysics of Virtual Reality, Michael Heim identifies seven different concepts of Virtual Reality: simulation, interaction, artificiality, immersion, telepresence, full-body immersion, and network communication. The definition still has a certain futuristic romanticism attached. People often identify VR with Head Mounted Displays and Data Suits.
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News tagged with virtual reality
Pushing the brain to find new pathways
Nov 17, 2009 |
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Until recently, scientists believed that, following a stroke, a patient had about six months to regain any lost function. After that, patients would be forced to compensate for the lost function by focusing on their remaining ...
Virtual reality games could help bullying victims
Medicine & Health / Psychology & Psychiatry
Nov 09, 2009 |
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(PhysOrg.com) -- Virtual reality games could help children to escape victimisation and bullying at school, according to researchers at the University of Warwick.
Iowa State engineers develop 3-D software to give doctors, students a view inside the body
Nov 11, 2009 |
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James Oliver picked up an Xbox game controller, looked up to a video screen and used the device's buttons and joystick to fly through a patient's chest cavity for an up-close look at the bottom of the heart.
Virtual Reality May Help Arm Minds for Combat
Nov 13, 2009 |
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(PhysOrg.com) -- The UT Dallas Center for BrainHealth received a federal grant to fund research examining brain performance enhancement in America’s fighting men and women through the use of state-of-the-art ...
Search results for virtual reality
Brain maps help guide you through large-scale space, researchers find
Medicine & Health / Neuroscience
Nov 03, 2009 |
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Lost? Not sure how to get home? Trying to find your way through the mall or an airport? Help is on the way, thanks to a stack of cells, or neurons, in your head. They're mostly on the left side of the brain in males, on the ...
Creating 3D models with a simple webcam (w/ Video)
Technology / Computer Sciences
Nov 11, 2009 |
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(PhysOrg.com) -- Constructing virtual 3D models usually requires heavy and expensive equipment, or takes lengthy amounts of time. A group of researchers at the University of Cambridge, Qi Pan, Dr Gerhard Reitmayr ...
Portable 3-D laser technology preserves Texas dinosaur's rare footprint
Other Sciences / Archaeology & Fossils
Nov 04, 2009 |
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Using portable 3D laser technology, scientists have electronically preserved a rare 110 million-year-old fossilized dinosaur footprint that was previously excavated and built into the wall of a bandstand at a Texas courthouse ...
Invisibility visualized: German team unveils new software for rendering cloaked objects
Nov 13, 2009 |
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(PhysOrg.com) -- Scientists and curiosity seekers who want to know what a partially or completely cloaked object would look like in real life can now get their wish -- virtually. A team of researchers at the ...
Web site help for students applying to college
Nov 03, 2009 |
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Two of my best friends are named Pete. We went to the same high school and the same university, Cal State Fullerton, which has been described as "the Harvard of north Orange County" -- by me, at least.
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