Real-Time Augmented Reality Physics Simulator for Education

Sung Sung,Hong Hong,Choi Choi,Ma Ma

doi:10.3390/app9194019

Sung Sung, Hong Hong + Show 2 more

Open Access

https://doi.org/10.3390/app9194019

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Abstract

Physics education applications using augmented reality technology, which has been developed extensively in recent years, have a lot of restrictions in terms of performance and accuracy. The purpose of our research is to develop a real-time simulation system for physics education that is based on parallel processing. In this paper, we present a video see-through AR (Augmented Reality) system that includes an environment recognizer using a depth image of Microsoft’s Kinect V2 and a real-time soft body simulator based on parallel processing using GPU (Graphic Processing Unit). Soft body simulation can provide more realistic simulation results than rigid body simulation, so it can be more effective in systems for physics education. We have designed and implemented a system that provides the physical deformation and movement of 3D volumetric objects, and uses them in education. To verify the usefulness of the proposed system, we conducted a questionnaire survey of 10 students majoring in physics education. As a result of the questionnaire survey, 93% of respondents answered that they would like to use it for education. We plan to use the stand-alone AR device including one or more cameras to improve the system in the future.

Highlights

Augmented reality is a technique of rendering a virtual object on a real image captured through a camera, and has the advantage of providing a sense of reality that is different from virtual reality
We have developed a real-time simulator for the augmented reality environment based on lightweight physics simulation technology using parallel processing
We proposed physics education content by combining existing image processing technologies and our real-time soft body simulation technology

Summary

Introduction

Augmented reality is a technique of rendering a virtual object on a real image captured through a camera, and has the advantage of providing a sense of reality that is different from virtual reality. Many augmented reality contents are being released due to the development of various augmented reality platforms (Vuforia, AUGMENT, et al.) and libraries (ARKit, ARCore, Maxst, et al.) [1,2,3]. While Microsoft Hololens and Epson Moverio, which are dedicated hardware for augmented reality, have been unveiled, they are still unable to provide high-performance, due to low computing power [4,5]. Augmented reality is used in various fields, such as tourism, medical care, performance, education, and games. The AR technologies in particular have been actively applied to the fields of games and education

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