The Geosystems Research Institute is striving to advance the technology and utilization of scientific visualization, information visualization, visual analysis, and image processing for the computational sciences.

GRI realizes the concept that a fundamental goal of visualization is to enable and enhance human comprehension of complex phenomena. Although the field of computational engineering is capable of solving many real-world problems, visualizing these computed datasets for optimal human understanding remains a challenge. To seek better solutions to this problem, GRI employs a cross-disciplinary group of scientists and engineers which includes electrical engineers, computer engineers, computer scientists, and computational engineers. This cross-disciplinary group houses expertise in visualization algorithms and systems, virtual environments, level-of-detail representations, hierarchical data structures, progressive coding/rendering, wavelet coding/analysis/rendering and optimizing human learning and performance.

GRI is developing hardware and software systems which allow analysts with access to many large data sources to see those datasets in a viewing "environment". This capability enables them to extract the maximum amount of information from the datasets and study the optimal method to display various sets of multiple co-located datasets (topography, bathymetry, coastline, oceanography, and atmosphere) in the same view. Focus is on developing new 2D and 3D visualization tools for people ranging from hurricane experts to the general public.

One of many applications for a visualization environment deals with improving public understanding of severe storms. For states along the Gulf of Mexico this naturally brings hurricanes to mind. GRI researchers utilizes the VERTEX facility to see visualizations of Hurricanes Lili and Isabel. Expert climatologist and meteorologist can concentrate on climate dynamics and hydrometeorology to better understand the dynamics of severe storms.

The VERTEX, or the Virtual Environment for Real-Time EXploration, facility is located within the High Performance Computing Collaboratory Building. The VERTEX facility provides the ability to create any type of virtual environment. Software that has been developed in the past, or that is expected to be developed, will allow in-depth studies in various fields such as hurricane models, forest management, architecture models, vehicular models, and airplane, rocket, and submarine development.

Research Projects

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Visualization Techniques for Improving Public Understanding of Catastrophic Events

Geosystems Research Institute, an HPC2 Affiliate  •  Director: David R. Shaw, Ph.D. Modified: March 17, 2009  •  WebMaster  •  Directory  •  Publications  •  Intranet