Towards an extensible atlas-based three-dimensional visualization framework for biomedicine: biolucida

Today's biomedical research endeavors often entail exposure to a daunting amount of expressive data, much of it spatially attributable. These data must be effectively comprehended and communicated, and it has been well established that visualization is a powerful means of doing so. Because these data are often associated with structures of anatomy that can be represented as computer-generated 3D models, it is possible to create a biomedical atlas which can be leveraged as an effective visualization motif. This style of presentation not only conveys spatial relationships inherent in the data, but also provides a natural representation which is easily understood by a wide audience. Many systems have been produced which can be considered computer-based biomedical atlases, some of which have been used to visualize data and to illustrate spatially complex concepts. However, the development of these systems has been costly due to the fact that many, while similar in features and design, have been built from the ground up as single-purpose applications. A next-generation visualization system, Biolucida, has been developed as a generalizable framework which is designed to meet the 3D visualization needs of the biomedical community through its comprehensive feature set and its extensible architecture. Biolucida has been implemented as a client/server Java-based system, which allows developers to create plugin modules which govern the functionality and content of immersive 3D visualizations, requiring only a fraction of the time it would take to develop a use-case-specific system.