Computer Science Department News

 

Boykov and Veksler receive CFI New Opportunities Grant

 

Olga & Yuri

The Department congratulates Yuri Boykov and Olga Veksler for receiving a CFI New Opportunities grant. The requested funds will provide the essential infrastructure for Dr. Boykov and Dr. Veksler to establish a new research laboratory for developing innovative computer vision and biomedical image analysis systems for 3D modeling from visual data. The are three major components that are essential for image-based 3D modeling from visual data: (1) photo and video equipment for capturing photo/video data; (2) software and hardware for visual data processing and storing; (3) other special purpose hardware (laser scanner and a mobile platform) for performance optimization, validation, and mobility. The laboratory will be located at the Western Science Center.

The research in the laboratory will focus on development of easy-to-use and fast technologies for extracting and analyzing 3D shape, appearance, and motion of small scale objects (artifacts, industrial parts, humans/animals, organs, plants) and of large scale 3D environments (buildings interior and exterior, natural and developed terrains). Current technologies for acquisition of static or dynamic computer models from visual data are still in their infancy in large part due to mathematically ill-posed nature of the problems involved. At the same time, such technologies are critical for developing advanced applications in manufacturing (computer-assisted design, augmented reality, quality control), agriculture (plant monitoring, produce inspection), bio-medical engineering (computer-assisted diagnosis, surgery planning, robot-assisted surgery, drug development), entertainment (special effects, virtual actors, animation, game design), digital preservation of historical and cultural heritage, human-computer interaction (perceptual interfaces), as well as for bringing to every-day life a scope of virtual reality applications (virtual tourism, virtual museum, telepresence, immersive training environments).

 

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