While an exciting and contemporary field, the subject of virtual reality (VR) receives little treatment in most undergraduate computer science curriculums. This paper describes the author’s efforts to provide an overview of VR as the final component of his introductory computer graphics course. Specifically, students learn about the defining characteristics of VR and some of its enabling techno...

The role of Virtual Reality (VR) tools in molecular sciences is analyzed in this contribution through the presentation of the Caffeine software to the quantum chemistry community. Caffeine, developed at Scuola Normale Superiore, is specifically tailored for molecular representation and data visualization with VR systems, such as VR theaters and helmets. Usefulness and advantages that can be gai...

OBJECTIVE This study examined the effects of videogame distraction and a virtual reality (VR) type head-mounted display helmet for children undergoing cold pressor pain. METHODS Fifty children between the ages of 6 and 10 years underwent a baseline cold pressor trial followed by two cold pressor trials in which interactive videogame distraction was delivered via a VR helmet or without a VR he...

Excessive pain during medical procedures, such as burn wound dressing changes, is a widespread medical problem and is especially challenging for children. This article describes the rationale behind virtual reality (VR) pain distraction, a new non-pharmacologic adjunctive analgesia, and gives a brief summary of empirical studies exploring whether VR reduces clinical procedural pain. Results ind...

The use of Virtual Reality (VR) in schools and higher education is proliferating. Due to its interactive and animated features, it is regarded as a promising technology to increase students’ spatial ability. Spatial ability is assumed to have a prominent role in science and engineering domains. However, research concerning individual differences such as spatial ability in the context of VR is s...

Virtual Reality (VR) is usually described by the media as a particular collection of technological hardware: a computer capable of 3D real-time animation, a head-mounted display, data gloves equipped with one or more position trackers. However, this focus on technology is disappointing for communication researchers and VR designers. To overcome this limitation this paper describes VR as a commu...

In spite of the large amount of "hype" that accompanied virtual reality (VR) earlier this decade, the field has produced only a few examples of demonstrably useful systems. Systems must be fielded and validated to show that VR is useful for purposes other than academic research. This paper discusses two VR systems developed at the Naval Research Laboratory that have received validation by stati...

Virtual reality (VR) therapy is a new, neurorehabilitation intervention aimed at enhancing motor performance in children with hemiparetic cerebral palsy (CP). This case report investigated the effects of VR therapy on cortical reorganization and associated motor function in an 8-year-old male with hemiparetic CP. Cortical activation and associated motor development were measured before and afte...

BACKGROUND: Vocational Rehabilitation (VR) provides counseling, training, job placement, assistive technology and other support services to people with disabilities. VR counselors work to find employment consistent with their client’s strengths, resources, priorities, concerns, abilities, capabilities, interests and informed choice. In order for VR counselors to be successful and effective in p...

This paper describes a proposed support system which enables applications designers to effectively create VR applications using multiple haptic APIs. When the VR designers create applications, it is often difficult to handle and understand many parameters and functions that have to be set in the application program using documentation manuals only. This complication may disrupt creative imagina...