Visualizing dynamic systems in three dimensions
Roger Crawfis, Nelson Max · OSTI OAI (U.S. Department of Energy Office of Scientific and Technical Information) · 1993
Modern computers have enabled researchers to gather ever more massive quantities of data. The processing of such huge quantities of information has become humanly impossible without the intervention of scientific visualization-computer methods of converting data into visual formats that allow the information to be grasped and analyzed. We have created algorithms that allow three-dimensional data, both scalar and vector, to be represented visually. The algorithms cover a wide range of techniques, from techniques for showing the cloud cover over the globe or a portion of it, to techniques for representing global views of vector fields (such as global wind currents), to the interactive smoke generator for studying flow patterns in specific areas. Although much of our attention in developing these algorithms has been directed to atmospheric research, these algorithms can be applied to virtually any realm of scientific investigation, right down to the simulation of atomic and subatomic events.