Distributed Collaborative Virtual Wind Tunnel
The VWT software, which runs on the Virtual Workbench by Fakespace Inc., creates a fully immersive virtual environment where researchers can interact with aerospace simulation data spread over complex three-dimensional fields. Inside the collaborative workspace, this data can be portrayed in many different forms and can be examined from any point of view. Recently, the VWT has been modified to allow researchers in geographically distant locations to participate in the same virtual session. A central server generates the geometrical data required for each scene, while client workstations run an application viewer. A serious research tool for aerospace engineers, the VWT offers a quick and easy way for researchers to explore the behavior of flow patterns at any point around a simulated craft, discovering irregularities that would be nearly impossible to spot under normal conditions.

Lunar Prospector Web Site
The Lunar Prospector web site allowed users around the world to monitor real-time data from NASA’s Lunar Prospector mission, which ended in July 1999 with a controlled crash into the lunar surface. The site, which was implemented using Java applets, Javascript, Netscape LiveConnect, and other Web technologies, displayed information such as craft system health data, science data from sensing instruments, and the craft’s location over the lunar terrain. It served as a prototype project for using a distributed infrastructure (the Web) as a means of instantaneous global communication.

Mars Landing Web Site
Researchers debating where to land the planned Mars Surveyor 2001 mission now have an online forum — the Mars Surveyor Landing Sites web site where they can post their arguments and refer to hundreds of three-dimensional images of the Martian surface. Researchers at NAS and the Ames Space Sciences Division designed the site to give all interested scientists an equal chance to make the case for their favorite landing spots. Researchers can examine their colleagues’ data, review archives of landing site workshops, learn about engineering constraints, and read and respond to each others’ arguments at their leisure. Adding depth to the site are 3-D models of more than 70 proposed landing sites encoded in Virtual Reality Modeling Language (VRML) format.

Virtual Collaborative Clinic
Researchers at the Ames Center for Bioinformatics have developed a distributed, collaborative virtual workspace for surgeons and other medical professionals. Advanced high-fidelity 3-D imaging and high-bandwidth networks "bring the clinic to the patient" by allowing physicians to share complex patient data such as MRI results for remote consultation, diagnosis, treatment planning, and simulation. Eventually, such systems could help deliver care to people in remote places (including the International Space Station). In November 1999, the NAS Systems Division provided network connections and visualization equipment to demonstrate the Virtual Collaborative Clinic at the SC99 conference in Portland, Oregon.