Three-dimensional Data Capture Research Articles

Three-dimensional data capture and analysis of intact eye lenses evidences emmetropia-associated changes in epithelial cell organization

Organ and tissue development are highly coordinated processes; lens growth and functional integration into the eye (emmetropia) is a robust example. An epithelial monolayer covers the anterior hemisphere of the lens, and its organization is the key to lens formation and its optical properties throughout all life stages. To better understand how the epithelium supports lens function, we have developed a novel whole tissue imaging system using conventional confocal light microscopy and a specialized analysis software to produce three-dimensional maps for the epithelium of intact mouse lenses. The open source software package geometrically determines the anterior pole position, the equatorial diameter, and three-dimensional coordinates for each detected cell in the epithelium. The user-friendly cell maps, which retain global lens geometry, allow us to document age-dependent changes in the C57/BL6J mouse lens cell distribution characteristics. We evidence changes in epithelial cell density and distribution in C57/BL6J mice during the establishment of emmetropia between postnatal weeks 4–6. These epithelial changes accompany a previously unknown spheroid to lentoid shape transition of the lens as detected by our analyses. When combined with key findings from previous mouse genetic and cell biological studies, we suggest a cytoskeleton-based mechanism likely underpins these observations.

Modeling evacuation in institutional space: Linking three-dimensional data capture, simulation, analysis, and visualization workflows for risk assessment and communication

This article presents exploratory research to develop new workflows that address the challenges of adequately capturing the geometry and topology of complex institutional spaces, the analysis of prescriptive evacuation plans, and the simulation of human movement and behavior in emergency scenarios. We present a collection of geovisual analytical environments that were developed to permit new ways to view and assess risk, evacuation, and human movement. Part of this research considers how different approaches to the representation of complex institutional space, using three-dimensional capture technologies at multiple resolutions (or derived from conventional formats, such as building plans), have implicit advantages or liabilities in the analysis of risk and human evacuation. We combine three-dimensional data capture methods with geographical information science theory, three-dimensional game engines, three-dimensional evacuation simulations and spatial analyses that address the variability of campus populations, and draw upon three-dimensional modeling and photogrammetry for the assessment of real-world features in digital space. The outcome of this research demonstrates agile workflows that address emergency planning requirements, but could also enable enhanced visual analysis and interactive learning by all campus citizens. Furthermore, this work reveals key considerations and limitations associated with the dynamic nature of evacuation events and the static environments in which they have been simulated.

Preserving the Impossible: Conservation of Soft-Sediment Hominin Footprint Sites and Strategies for Three-Dimensional Digital Data Capture

Human footprints provide some of the most publically emotive and tangible evidence of our ancestors. To the scientific community they provide evidence of stature, presence, behaviour and in the case of early hominins potential evidence with respect to the evolution of gait. While rare in the geological record the number of footprint sites has increased in recent years along with the analytical tools available for their study. Many of these sites are at risk from rapid erosion, including the Ileret footprints in northern Kenya which are second only in age to those at Laetoli (Tanzania). Unlithified, soft-sediment footprint sites such these pose a significant geoconservation challenge. In the first part of this paper conservation and preservation options are explored leading to the conclusion that to ‘record and digitally rescue’ provides the only viable approach. Key to such strategies is the increasing availability of three-dimensional data capture either via optical laser scanning and/or digital photogrammetry. Within the discipline there is a developing schism between those that favour one approach over the other and a requirement from geoconservationists and the scientific community for some form of objective appraisal of these alternatives is necessary. Consequently in the second part of this paper we evaluate these alternative approaches and the role they can play in a ‘record and digitally rescue’ conservation strategy. Using modern footprint data, digital models created via optical laser scanning are compared to those generated by state-of-the-art photogrammetry. Both methods give comparable although subtly different results. This data is evaluated alongside a review of field deployment issues to provide guidance to the community with respect to the factors which need to be considered in digital conservation of human/hominin footprints.

Outlining a strategic vision for terrestrial geodetic imaging

Charting the Future of Terrestrial Laser Scanning in the Earth Sciences and Related Fields; Boulder, Colorado, 17–19 October 2011 A workshop hosted by UNAVCO and funded by the U.S. National Science Foundation (NSF) brought together 80 participants representing a spectrum of research fields with the objective of outlining a strategic vision for the future of terrestrial geodetic imaging as applied to a broad range of research activities at all levels of the community. Earth science investigations increasingly require accurate representation of the Earth surface using three‐dimensional data capture, display, and analysis at a centimeter scale to quantitatively characterize and model complex processes. Recognizing this community need, researchers at several universities and UNAVCO established the NSF‐funded Interdisciplinary Alliance for Digital Field Data Acquisition and Exploration (INTERFACE) project to support a terrestrial laser scanning (TLS) instrument pool and data collection expertise now based at UNAVCO

The Eton Myers collection virtual museum

The digitisation of museum collections provides great opportunities for broad communication and access. However, currently the majority of online ‘virtual’ museums present information two-dimensionally. Three-dimensional data capture using laser scanning provides the potential to generate 3D virtual objects that can be used for a much greater interactive experience. This paper presents the results of a JISC-funded project aimed at the generation of a 3D online museum of an internationally important collection of Egyptological artefacts that have not previously been publicly available. The results from the project demonstrate the value of 3D museums, in addition to highlighting some of the future possibilities for interaction with objects and the ways in which such virtual museums can revolutionise access to collections for education and public interest. It also stresses ways in which such collections can benefit scholars in terms of reference collections, object analysis and interpretation. The question of objectivity and authenticity of virtual collections, in comparison with real objects is raised.

Statistical analysis of the three dimensional joint complex

Although three-dimensional data capture has become routine, statistical methods that take appropriate advantage of these multivariate data have not been widely developed. Researchers frequently rely on multiple isolated univariate statistical methods in the analysis of a joint's several axes of rotation and their associated motions. This approach reflects an inherent flaw in that it fails to appreciate the unbreakable link among these descriptors. We propose a new analytical perspective. Borrowing from the techniques of geometric morphometrics, data that describe multiple joint axis orientations and the motions about them are converted into a shape, an axis triangle, that is viewable in a three-dimensional space. In this format, multivariate statistical analyses can be conducted using conventional analytical packages. The axis triangle technique represents a significant advance over current analytical approaches in that it provides an encompassing method of appreciating joint rotations, as well as comprehensive consideration of joint function by linking rotational axis orientations with associated motion patterns.