Our goal is to create and validate the paradigm of a Real-Time Haptic Immersive Virtual Environment (RT-HIVE) as a venue to expand, assist, train and monitor human sensorimotor skills/strengths, using the case-study of a Virtual Cadaveric Anatomic Simulator (VCAS) for anatomical dissection training.
Intellectual Merit: To realistically mimic the ?feel? and response of tissues during dissection/surgery requires the development of new techniques and methods and furthering the state-of-knowledge in the engineering/computational domains including: (i) novel design- and control-architectures for enhanced Haptic User Interfaces; (ii) advances in distributed architectures/algorithms for real-time tool-interactions with irregular, inhomogeneous and nonlinear biological materials; and (iii) validation of transparent monitoring and quantitative assessment protocols for sensorimotor training.
Broader Impact: The integration of such a VCAS simulator with systematic education programs will revolutionize the training of the next generation of health-care professionals (from novitiate nurses/ medical students to specialist surgeons/pathologists). We also see the VCAS as an important teaching and collaboration tool in research labs, classrooms, application settings or in conjunction with museum displays. Finally, the architecture, algorithms and validation efforts would be invaluable in the development of other such Virtual Reality (VR) based simulators.
