Virtual Laboratories and Virtual Worlds

Authors: Piet Hut (IAS, Princeton)

(Submitted on 11 Dec 2007)

Abstract: Since we cannot put stars in a laboratory, astrophysicists had to wait till the invention of computers before becoming laboratory scientists. For half a century now, we have been conducting experiments in our virtual laboratories. However, we ourselves have remained behind the keyboard, with the screen of the monitor separating us from the world we are simulating.

Recently, 3D on-line technology, developed first for games but now deployed in virtual worlds like Second Life, is beginning to make it possible for astrophysicists to enter their virtual labs themselves, in virtual form as avatars. This has several advantages, from new possibilities to explore the results of the simulations to a shared presence in a virtual lab with remote collaborators on different continents. I will report my experiences with the use of Qwaq Forums, a virtual world developed by a new company (see this http URL)

Comments: 10 pages, 2 figures, Conference proceedings for IAUS246 'Dynamical Evolution of Dense Stellar Systems', ed. E. Vesperini (Chief Editor), M. Giersz, A. Sills, Capri, Sept. 2007

Subjects: Astrophysics (astro-ph); Human-Computer Interaction (cs.HC); Computational Physics (physics.comp-ph)

Cite as: arXiv:0712.1655v1 [astro-ph]

Submission history

From: Piet Hut [view email]

[v1] Tue, 11 Dec 2007 07:05:36 GMT (249kb)

http://arxiv.org/abs/0712.1655