MedVis: A Real-Time Immersive Visualization Environment for the Exploration of Medical Volumetric Data

Abstract

This paper describes the Medical Visualizer, a real-time visualization system for analyzing medical volumetric data in various virtual environments, such as autostereoscopic displays, dual-projector screens and immersive environments such as the CAVE. Direct volume rendering is used for visualizing the details of medical volumetric data sets without intermediate geometric representations. By interactively manipulating the color and transparency functions through the friendly user interface, radiologists can either inspect the data set as a whole or focus on a specific region. In our system, 3D texture hardware is employed to accelerate the rendering process. The system is designed to be platform independent, as all virtual reality functions are separated from kernel functions. Due to its modular design, our system can be easily extended to other virtual environments, and new functions can be incorporated rapidly.