This Small Business Innovation Research Phase I project investigates the feasibility and design of a novel authoring and server-client system that delivers interactive education-on-demand for technique training and telescience. Rich media including live and archived video, data, and 3-D models are (1) collected from instructor sources, (2) objectized and integrated into MPEG-4, MPEG-7, and MPEG-21 compliant streams, (3) securely conveyed via dynamically selected transport protocols to wide audiences with diverse computing platforms (from workstations to wireless PDAs), (4) tailored to individual demographics and physical handicap, and (5) rendered in a participant-driven interactive fashion that supports user-directed manipulation of views and articulation of models, real-time scientific visualization, technique learning, real-time analysis of experiment data, and experiment control (if authorized) without the need of special hardware. The client admits future media types, and user-supplied extensions (e.g., MatLab workspaces) for personalized data analysis, and content is adapted to the demographics, physical handicaps, and computing resources of the student. A graphical authoring tool facilitates the set-up of lectures and peer sessions, and assessment of student performance and courseware. The concept proffered by Sorceron provides technique training and telescience to the academic and commercial markets, which require interactivity not available in traditional streaming media architectures. Commercial success is enhanced by compliance with emerging multimedia standards and partnering with potential clients during technical and business requirements assessment.
