10 scientific problems in virtual reality

Abstract

Virtual Reality was one of the 14 Grand Challenges identified as awaiting engineering solutions for the 21st century announced in 2008 by the U.S. National Academy of Engineering (NAE http://www.nae.edu/). Here, I explore 10 related open VR challenges, with hoped-for potential breakthroughs promising to advance VR techniques and applications. VR is today being applied in multiple contexts, including training, exercise, engineering design, and entertainment, while also serving as a research tool in such fields as neuroscience and psychology, as explored in Michael Heim's pioneering 1993 book Metaphysics of Virtual Reality (http://www.mheim.com/books.html). More recently, scholars have described the Internet itself as representing a virtual world modeling its real-world counterpart. The relationship between VR and its application fields is, in terms of expression and validation, like the relationship between mathematics and physics, while VR is attracting attention from a growing number of governments and science/engineering communities. Along with the NAE Committee on Engineering 14 Grand Challenges (http://www.engineeringchallenges.org/), the Chinese government's 2006 report Development Plan Outline for Medium- and Long-Term Science and Technology Development (2006--2020) (http://www.gov.cn/jrzg/2006-02/09/content_183787.htm) and the Japanese government's 2007 report Innovation 2025 (http://www.cao.go.jp/innovation/index.html) both included VR as a priority technology worthy of development. VR has likewise emerged as an important research area for many Chinese universities and research institutes, ranging from theoretical foundations to technology innovation, system development, and practical applications. For example, Zhejiang University in Hangzhou and Tsinghua University in Beijing are known for realistic modeling and rendering; Peking University in Beijing focuses on computer vision and human-machine interaction; the Beijing Institute of Technology in Beijing emphasizes head-mounted displays; and the Institute of Computing Technology of Chinese Academy of Sciences in Beijing has made significant progress in crowd simulation. Since 1995, I have directed the State Key Laboratory of Virtual Reality Technology and Systems of China (http://www.skvrlab.net) in Beijing, focusing on VR. Over that time, we have proposed many new methods and technologies in distributed virtual environments, realistic modeling and rendering, and augmented reality, including two major VR software infrastructures: BH_RTI for distributed virtual environments (http://www.hlarti.com) and BH_GRAPH for real-time 3D rendering (http://www.skvrlab.net:8080/soft). This work has produced several influential VR application systems, including the 2008 Beijing Olympic Games Opening Ceremony Simulation Platform and the Beijing 08 Digital Museum. We also designed a training-and-scenario-simulation system for a military review of China's 2009 60th anniversary celebration, with more than 8,000 soldiers, based on visualized immersion technologies to deliver scenario preview, modification, and decision-making functions. Meanwhile, our work advancing theory in related fundamental disciplines may help produce further breakthroughs in VR; for example, electrorheological fluids could change the existing method of haptic rendering.