AlloSphere

The AlloSphere Research Facility

Elings Hall which houses The AlloSphere, August 2013

Established| 2007; 19 years ago (2007)

Field of research

| Technology, multimedia, sciences, art, design
Director| JoAnn Kuchera-Morin
Location| Santa Barbara, California, United States
Campus| University of California, Santa Barbara
Website| http://www.allosphere.ucsb.edu/

The AlloSphere is a research facility in a theatre-like pavilion in a spherical shape, of opaque material, used to project computer-generated imagery and sounds. Included are GIS, scientific, artistic, and other information.[1] Located at the University of California, Santa Barbara (UCSB) the AlloSphere grew out of the schools of electrical engineering and computer science, and the Media Arts & Technology program at UCSB.[2]

The AlloSphere is housed at UCSB California NanoSystems Institute[3] building, "CNSI," or Elings Hall, a 62,000-square-foot (5,800 m2) facility that opened in 2007.[4] The AlloSphere is intended to integrate technology and media.[5]

The AlloSphere includes a three-story cube that has been insulated extensively with sound-absorbing material, making it one of the largest echo-less chambers in the world. Within the chamber are two hemispheres of 5 meter radii, made of perforated aluminum. These are opaque and acoustically transparent.[6]

There are 26 video projectors, to create as much of a field of vision as possible.[6]

The loudspeaker real-time sound synthesis cluster (140 individual speaker elements plus sub-woofers) is suspended behind the aluminum screen resulting in 3-D audio. Computation clusters include simulation, sensor-array processing, real-time video processing for motion-capture and visual computing, render-farm/real-time ray-tracing and radiosity cluster, and content and prototyping environments.[6]

The AlloSphere was developed by a team of scientists, led primarily by Professor JoAnn Kuchera-Morin, a professor in the field of Composition, of the Media Arts & Technology Program of UCSB.[6]

## Selected publications

* The AlloSphere Offers an Interactive Experience of Nano-sized Worlds https://www.nsf.gov/discoveries/disc_summ.jsp?cntn_id=121535&WT.mc_id=USNSF_1
* Research at the AlloSphere Facility https://www.nsf.gov/news/mmg/mmg_disp.jsp?med_id=73444
* Equipping the AlloSphere, an Environment for Immersive Data Exploration https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=0855279
* Big Data's People-Changing Machine https://www.forbes.com/sites/quentinhardy/2011/07/11/big-datas-people-changing-machine/
* Marriage of Science & Art https://web.archive.org/web/20160302151948/http://www.ucsbalum.com/Coastlines/2011/Summer/feature_allosphere.html
* Living Data: The Three-Story-High AlloSphere Creates Unique Visualizations http://www.technologyreview.com/photoessay/420413/living-data/
* Sensory Overloader: 3-D Tower Lets Researchers Climb Inside Their Data https://www.wired.com/2010/05/st_allosphere/?pid=2039
* A 360-Degree Virtual Reality Chamber Brings Researchers Face to Face with Their Data https://www.wired.com/2010/05/st_allosphere/?pid=2039
* Enter the AlloSphere: Inside UCSB's Three-Dimensional Immersive Theater, the 21st Century Face of Our Discipline-Bending University http://www.independent.com/news/2008/nov/06/enter-allosphere/

## References

1. ↑ "The AlloSphere Offers an Interactive Experience of Nano-sized Worlds | NSF - National Science Foundation". https://www.nsf.gov/discoveries/disc_summ.jsp?cntn_id=121535. Retrieved 2015-09-02.
2. ↑ "JoAnn Kuchera-Morin: Stunning Data Visualization in the AlloSphere - Blog". http://datascience.berkeley.edu/joann-kuchera-morin-stunning-data-visualization-allosphere/. Retrieved 2015-09-02.
3. ↑ "California NanoSystems Institute | UC Santa Barbara". http://www.cnsi.ucsb.edu/. Retrieved 2015-09-02.
4. ↑ Van De Werfhorst, Melissa (August 2007). "UC Santa Barbara Engineering Facts Brochure". UCSB College of Engineering. Archived from the original on March 4, 2016. https://web.archive.org/web/20160304045938/http://engineering.ucsb.edu/pdf/facts_august2007_final.pdf. Retrieved September 2, 2015.
5. ↑ "Marriage of Science and Art". http://www.ucsbalum.com/Coastlines/2011/Summer/feature_allosphere.html. Retrieved 2015-09-02.
6. ↑ 6.0 6.1 6.2 6.3 "The AlloSphere at the California NanoSystems Institute, UC Santa Barbara". http://www.allosphere.ucsb.edu/. Retrieved 2015-09-02.

## External links

* Video: Talks Demo: Stunning data visualization in the AlloSphere, JoAnn Kuchera-Morin lecture at TED Talks

[ ⚑ ]  34°24′57″N 119°50′23″W﻿ / ﻿34.41578°N 119.8398°W﻿ / 34.41578; -119.8398

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