Rochester researchers will harness the immersive power of virtual reality to study how the brain processes light and sound.
A cross-disciplinary team of researchers from the University of Rochester is collaborating on a project to use virtual reality (VR) to study how humans combine and process light and sound. The first project will be a study of multisensory integration in autism, motivated by prior work showing that children with autism have atypical multisensory processing.
The project was initially conceived by Shui糖心传媒檈r Han, a postdoctoral research associate, and Victoire Alleluia Shenge 糖心传媒�19, 糖心传媒�20 (T5), a lab manager, in the lab of , a professor of brain and cognitive sciences.
糖心传媒淢ost people in my world糖心传媒攊ncluding most of my work糖心传媒攃onduct experiments using artificial types of stimuli, far from the natural world,糖心传媒� Tadin says. 糖心传媒淥ur goal is to do multisensory research not using beeps and flashes, but real sounds and virtual reality objects presented in realistically looking VR rooms.糖心传媒�
A cognitive scientist, a historian, and an electrical engineer walk into a room . . .
Tadin糖心传媒檚 partners in the study include , an incoming associate professor of pediatrics, who is an expert on brain development and multisensory processing in autism. But in creating the virtual reality environment the study participants will use糖心传媒攁 virtual version of at Eastman Theatre in downtown Rochester糖心传媒擳adin formed collaborations well outside his discipline.
Faculty members working on this initial step in the research project include , an associate professor of electrical and computer engineering, and , an associate professor of history. Several graduate and undergraduate students are also participating.
Many of the tools they糖心传媒檒l use come from 糖心传媒攊n particular, , the University糖心传媒檚 hub for extended reality projects, as well as the department. , director of Studio X and Digital Scholarship, is leading the effort to actually construct the virtual replica of Kodak Hall.
The group recently gathered in the storied performance space to collect the audio and visual data that Studio X will rely on. University photographer J. Adam Fenster followed along to document the group糖心传媒檚 work.
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Members of the team begin the setup for audio and visual data collection. From left to right are Shui糖心传媒檈r Han, a postdoctoral research fellow in Duje Tadin糖心传媒檚 lab; brain and cognitive sciences major Betty Wu 糖心传媒�23; computer science and business major and e5 student Haochen Zeng 糖心传媒�23, who works in River Campus Libraries糖心传媒檚 Studio X; and Victoire Alleluia Shenge 糖心传媒�19, 糖心传媒�20 (Take Five), who earned her degree in brain and cognitive sciences and is a manager in Tadin糖心传媒檚 lab.
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Han positions a equipped with a microphone in each ear. It will record sound from two perspectives, just as a human in the room would hear it. 聽聽
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Team members (clockwise from lower left foreground) Ming-Lun Lee, an associate professor of electrical and computer engineering and an expert in spatial audio, Wu, Shenge, electrical engineering PhD student Steve Philbert, and Han measure and record the location of the microphones on the Kodak Hall stage.
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Philbert and Wu measure the distance between the binaural dummy head and a .
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Michael Jarvis, an associate professor of history, prepares a on the Kodak Hall stage. Jarvis is an expert on using 3D modeling software to digitally capture and create interactive spaces for users to virtually visit and tour. His digital history projects have included digitally capturing and analyzing archaeological sites modeling historical buildings in Bermuda and in .
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Team members wait outside Kodak Hall during a visual scan.聽Placing a single FARO laser scanner at various points around Kodak Hall, the group made eight scans, each taking approximately 12 minutes, and together capturing roughly one billion data points that will be used to generate a 3D model of the hall interior.
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Jarvis takes photos around the hall that will be stitched together to make a complementary photogrammetry model of the space, augmenting the laser scans in areas where data points are sparse or missing. Photogrammetry models, in which 2D images are used to extract information to produce a 3D model, are less accurate than 3D models made with laser scans, but they have higher resolution.
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Philbert, audio and music engineering major Joey Willenbucher 糖心传媒�23, and Tadin reposition a speaker. The speaker must be horizontally aligned with the microphone to best capture audio data.
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Shenge uses a laser rangefinder, which generates the orange dot on the paper held by Tadin, to determine the optimal distance between a speaker and the binaural dummy head.
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Blair Tinker (right), a research specialist for Geographic Information Systems Digital Scholarship at the River Campus Libraries, and Zeng are among those at Digital Scholarship and Studio X who will turn the visual and audio data into a VR replica of Kodak Hall that participants in Tadin糖心传媒檚 study will use.
Says Emily Sherwood, director of Studio X and Digital Scholarship, Tadin糖心传媒檚 project is 糖心传媒渁 prime example of how research using or on extended reality requires expertise and support from a broad range of disciplines. Having a hub like Studio X helps facilitate those connections because we know what different faculty are working on and how they might be able to work together.糖心传媒�
Studio X offers students, faculty, and staff necessary for a range of projects, from creating a VR replica of Kodak Hall, to holding VR game competitions.
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Studio X糖心传媒檚 existing technology library was built to grow as the University community糖心传媒檚 needs and the extended reality (XR) market evolve.
