DevLan/vispubs huggingface dataset:
TOPIC ISLANDS TM - a wavelet-based text visualization system
Authors: Nancy E. Miller, Pak Chung Wong, Mary Brewster, Harlan Foote
Published at Vis, 1998

We present a novel approach to visualize and explore unstructured text. The underlying technology, called TOPIC-O-GRAPHY/sup TM/, applies wavelet transforms to a custom digital signal constructed from words within a document. The resultant multiresolution wavelet energy is used to analyze the characteristics of the narrative flow in the frequency domain, such as theme changes, which is then related to the overall thematic content of the text document using statistical methods. The thematic characteristics of a document can be analyzed at varying degrees of detail, ranging from section-sized text partitions to partitions consisting of a few words. Using this technology, we are developing a visualization system prototype known as TOPIC ISLANDS to browse a document, generate fuzzy document outlines, summarize text by levels of detail and according to user interests, define meaningful subdocuments, query text content, and provide summaries of topic evolution.
Tracking scalar features in unstructured datasets
Authors: Deborah Silver, Xin Wang
Published at Vis, 1998

3D time-varying unstructured and structured data sets are difficult to visualize and analyze because of the immense amount of data involved. These data sets contain many evolving amorphous regions, and standard visualization techniques provide no facilities to aid the scientist to follow regions of interest. In this paper, we present a basic framework for the visualization of time-varying data sets, and a new algorithm and data structure to track volume features in unstructured scalar data sets. The algorithm and data structure are general and can be used for structured, curvilinear, adaptive and hybrid grids as well. The features tracked can be any type of connected regions. Examples are shown from ongoing research.
View dependent isosurface extraction
Authors: Yarden Livnat, Charles D. Hansen
Published at Vis, 1998

We propose a new approach to polygonal isosurface extraction that is based on extracting only the visible portion of the isosurface. The visibility tests are done in two phases. First, coarse visibility tests are performed in software to determine the visible cells. These tests are based on hierarchical tiles and shear-warp factorization. The second phase resolves the visible portions of the extracted triangles and is accomplished by the graphics hardware. While the latest isosurface extraction methods have effectively eliminated the search phase bottleneck, the cost of constructing and rendering the isosurface remains high. Many of today's large datasets contain very large and complex isosurfaces that can easily overwhelm even state-of-the-art graphics hardware. The proposed approach is output sensitive and is thus well suited for remote visualization applications where the extraction and rendering phases are done on a separate machines.
Visual presentation of magnetic resonance images
Authors: Johanna E. van der Heyden, Sheelagh Carpendale, Kevin B. Inkpen, M. Stella Atkins
Published at Vis, 1998

Medical image analysis is shifting from current film oriented light screen environments to computer environments that involve viewing and analyzing large sets of images on a computer screen. Magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) studies, in particular, can involve many images. The paper examines how best to meet the needs of radiologists in a computational environment. To this end, a field study was conducted to observe radiologists' interactions during MRI analysis in the traditional light screen environment. Key issues uncovered involve control over focus and context, dynamic grouping of images and retrieval of images and image groups. To address the problem of focus and context, existing layout adjustment and magnification techniques are explored to provide the most appropriate solution. Our interest is in combining the methodologies of human computer interaction studies with computational presentation possibilities to design a visual environment for the crucial field of medical image analysis.
Visualization for multiparameter aircraft designs
Authors: Clifford A. Shaffer, Duane L. Knill, Layne T. Watson
Published at Vis, 1998

We describe an aircraft design problem in high dimensional space, with D typically being 10 to 30. In some respects this is a classic optimization problem, where the goal is to find the point that minimizes an objective function while satisfying a set of constraints. However, evaluating an individual point is expensive, and the high dimensionality makes many approaches to solving the problem infeasible. The difficulty of the problem means that aircraft designers would benefit from any insights that can be provided. We discuss how simple visualizations have already proved beneficial, and then describe how visualization might be of further help in the future.
Visualization in corneal topography
Authors: Frans Vos, Hans J. W. Spoelder
Published at Vis, 1998

The anterior surface of the eye ('cornea') is extremely important for good sight. Instruments measuring corneal shape conventionally visualize the surface characteristics by mapping the instantaneous radius of curvature onto a rainbow colour scale. This technique is known to have important drawbacks. Firstly, not corneal shape itself is visualized, but rather second order surface properties. Secondly, the type of colouring produces well documented artifacts. We discuss visualization techniques for a more direct representation of the data. In a three part display, shape deviations are presented as a height surface in one window, height lines superimposed over the input image in another, and a colour mapped representation of the mean normal radius of curvature in a third. With the aid of some typical examples, it is shown that these visualizations are easy to interpret by the physician and overcome the limitations of the conventional techniques.
Visualization of scalar topology for structural enhancement
Authors: Chandrajit L. Bajaj, Valerio Pascucci, Daniel Schikore
Published at Vis, 1998

Scalar fields arise in every scientific application. Existing scalar visualization techniques require that the user infers the global scalar structure from what is frequently an insufficient display of information. We present a visualization technique which numerically detects the structure at all scales, removing from the user the responsibility of extracting information implicit in the data, and presenting the structure explicitly for analysis. We further demonstrate how scalar topology detection proves useful for correct visualization and image processing applications such as image co-registration, isocontouring, and mesh compression.
Visualizing differences in movies of cortical activity
Authors: Kay A. Robbins, David M. Senseman
Published at Vis, 1998

This paper discusses techniques for visualizing structure in video data and other data sets that represent time snapshots of physical phenomena. Individual frames of a movie are treated as vectors and projected onto a low-dimensional subspace spanned by principal components. Movies can be compared and their differences visualized by analyzing the nature of the subspace and the projections of multiple movies onto the same subspace. The approach is demonstrated on an application in neurobiology in which the electrical response of a visual cortex to optical stimulation is imaged onto a high-speed photodiode array to produce a cortical movie. Techniques for sampling movies over a single trial and multiple trials are discussed. The approach provides the traditional benefits of principal component analysis (compression, noise reduction and classification) and also allows the visual separation of spatial and temporal behavior.
Visualizing diffusion tensor images of the mouse spinal cord
Authors: David H. Laidlaw, Eric T. Ahrens, David Kremers, Matthew J. Avalos, Russell E. Jacobs, Carol Readhead
Published at Vis, 1998

Within biological systems, water molecules undergo continuous stochastic Brownian motion. The diffusion rate can give clues to the structure of the underlying tissues. In some tissues, the rate is anisotropic. Diffusion-rate images can be calculated from diffusion-weighted MRI. A 2D diffusion tensor image (DTI) and an associated anatomical scalar field define seven values at each spatial location. We present two new methods for visually representing DTIs. The first method displays an array of ellipsoids, where the shape of each ellipsoid represents one tensor value. The ellipsoids are all normalized to approximately the same size so that they can be displayed simultaneously in context. The second method uses concepts from oil painting to represent the seven-valued data with multiple layers of varying brush strokes. Both methods successfully display most or all of the information in DTIs and provide exploratory methods for understanding them. The ellipsoid method has a simpler interpretation and explanation than the painting-motivated method; the painting-motivated method displays more of the information and is easier to read quantatively. We demonstrate the methods on images of the mouse spinal cord. The visualizations show significant differences between spinal cords from mice suffering from experimental allergic encephalomyelitis and spinal cords from wild-type mice. The differences are consistent with differences shown histologically and suggest that our new non-invasive imaging methodology and visualization of the results could have early diagnostic value for neurodegenerative diseases.
Visualizing Hilbert curves
Authors: Nelson L. Max
Published at Vis, 1998

A computer animated movie was produced, illustrating both 2D and 3D Hilbert curves, and showing the transition from 2D to 3D with the help of volume rendering.
Volumetric modeling of acoustic fields in CNMAT's sound spatialization theatre
Authors: Sami Khoury, Adrian Freed, David Wessel
Published at Vis, 1998

A new tool for real time visualization of acoustic sound fields has been developed for a new sound spatialization theatre. The theatre is described and several applications of the acoustic and volumetric modeling software are presented. The visualization system described is a valuable tool for spatial sound researchers, sound engineers and composers using CNMAT's sound spatialization theatre. Further work is in progress on the adaptation of better acoustic simulation methods (M. Monks et al., 1996) for more accurate display of the quality of the reverberant field. The room database will be automatically extracted from a model built with 3D modeling software. Volume visualization strategies are being explored to display sounds in spectral and impulse response form.
Wavelets over curvilinear grids
Authors: Gregory M. Nielson, Il-Hong Jung, Junwon Sung
Published at Vis, 1998

We develop multiresolution models for analyzing and visualizing two-dimensional flows over curvilinear grids. Our models are based upon nested spaces of piecewise defined functions defined over nested curvilinear grid domains. The nested domains are selected so as to maintain the original geometry of the inner boundary. We first give the refinement and decomposition equations for Haar wavelets over these domains. Next, using lifting techniques we develop and show examples of piecewise linear wavelets over curvilinear grids.
Why is Real-Time Volume Rendering No Longer a Year Away?
Authors: Arie E. Kaufman, Marty Brady, William E. Lorensen, Frederick L. Kitson, Hanspeter Pfister
Published at Vis, 1998

Something new is happening in computer graphics. Volume rendering matured as a method for visualizing 3D sampled, simulated, and synthetic datasets. With a booming interest in real-time interactive volume rendering, and with a volume rendering chip being fabricated, volume rendering is a technology whose time has come. In addition to traditional polygonal rendering, commercial graphics systems now offer 3-D volumetric capabilities, and will soon offer volume rendering hardware accelerators.
Algorithm visualization for distributed environments
Authors: Yoram Moses, Zvi Polunsky, Ayellet Tal, Leonid Ulitsky
Published at InfoVis, 1998

The paper investigates the visualization of distributed algorithms. We present a conceptual model and a system, VADE, that realizes this model. Since in asynchronous distributed systems there is no way of knowing (let alone, visualizing) the "real" execution, we show how to generate a visualization which is consistent with the execution of the distributed algorithm. We also present the design and implementation of our system. VADE is designed so that the algorithm runs on the server's machines while the visualization is executed on a Web page on the client's machine. Programmers can write animations quickly and easily with the assistance of VADE's libraries.
An interactive view for hierarchical clustering
Authors: Graham J. Wills
Published at InfoVis, 1998

The paper describes a visualization of a general hierarchical clustering algorithm that allows the user to manipulate the number of classes produced by the clustering method without requiring a radical re-drawing of the clustering tree. The visual method used, a space filling recursive division of a rectangular area, keeps the items under consideration at the same screen position, even while the number of classes is under interactive control. As well as presenting a compact representation of the clustering with different cluster numbers, this method is particularly useful in a linked views environment where additional information can be added to a display to encode other information, without this added level of detail being perturbed when changes are made to the number of clusters.
An operator interaction framework for visualization systems
Authors: Ed H. Chi, John Riedl
Published at InfoVis, 1998

Information visualization encounters a wide variety of different data domains. The visualization community has developed representation methods and interactive techniques. As a community, we have realized that the requirements in each domain are often dramatically different. In order to easily apply existing methods, researchers have developed a semiology of graphic representations. We have extended this research into a framework that includes operators and interactions in visualization systems, such as a visualization spreadsheet. We discuss properties of this framework and use it to characterize operations spanning a variety of different visualization techniques. The framework developed in the paper enables a new way of exploring and evaluating the design space of visualization operators, and helps end users in their analysis tasks.
BiblioMapper: a cluster-based information visualization technique
Authors: Min Song
Published at InfoVis, 1998

The purpose of the paper is to develop a visualization system of a document space, called BiblioMapper, for CISI collections, one of the bibliographic databases available on the Internet. The major function of BiblioMapper is to visualize the document space with a cluster-based visualization technique. The cluster-based visualization technique assembles a set of documents according to semantic similarities. One advantage of this technique is that users are able to focus on and assess each cluster and the documents which the cluster comprises according to their information needs.
Comparative visualization of protein structure-sequence alignments
Authors: Marc D. Hansen, Doanna Meads, Alex T. Pang
Published at InfoVis, 1998

Protein fold recognition (threading) involves the prediction of a protein's three-dimensional shape based on its similarity to a protein whose structure is known. Fold predictions are low resolution; no effort is made to rotate the protein's component amino acid side chains into their correct spatial orientations. Rather, the goal is to recognize the protein family member that most closely resembles the target sequence of unknown structure and to create a sensible alignment of the target to the structure (i.e., a structure-sequence alignment). To complement this structure prediction method the authors have implemented a low resolution molecular graphics tool. Since amino acid side chain orientation is not relevant in fold recognition, amino acid residues are represented by abstract shapes or glyphs much like Lego/sup TM/ blocks. They also borrow techniques from comparative streamline visualization to provide clean depictions of the entire protein structure model. By creating a low resolution representation of protein structure, they are able to approximately double the amount of information on the screen. This implementation also possesses the advantage of eliminating distracting and possibly misleading visual clutter resulting from the mapping of protein alignment information onto a high resolution display of a known structure.
Dynamic aggregation with circular visual designs
Authors: Mei C. Chuah
Published at InfoVis, 1998

One very effective method for managing large data sets is aggregation or binning. We consider two aggregation methods that are tightly coupled with interactive manipulation and the visual representation of the data. Through this integration we hope to provide effective support for the aggregation process, specifically by enabling: 1) automatic aggregation, 2) continuous change and control of the aggregation level, 3) spatially based aggregates, 4) context maintenance across different aggregate levels, and 5) feedback on the level of aggregation.
Geographic visualization: designing manipulable maps for exploring temporally varying georeferenced statistics
Authors: Alan M. MacEachren, Francis P. Boscoe, Daniel Haug, Linda Pickle
Published at InfoVis, 1998

Geographic visualization, sometimes called cartographic visualization, is a form of information visualization in which principles from cartography, geographic information systems (GIS), exploratory data analysis (EDA), and information visualization more generally are integrated in the development and assessment of visual methods that facilitate the exploration, analysis, synthesis, and presentation of georeferenced information. The authors report on development and use of one component of a prototype GVis environment designed to facilitate exploration, by domain experts, of time series multivariate georeferenced health statistics. Emphasis is on how manipulable dynamic GVis tools may facilitate visual thinking, pattern noticing, and hypothesis generation. The prototype facilitates the highlighting of data extremes, examination of change in geographic patterns over time, and exploration of similarity among georeferenced variables. A qualitative exploratory analysis of verbal protocols and transaction logs is used to characterize system use. Evidence produced through the characterization highlights differences among experts in data analysis strategies (particularly in relation to the use of attribute "focusing" combined with time series animation) and corresponding differences in success at noticing spatiotemporal patterns.
IVORY-an object-oriented framework for physics-based information visualization in Java
Authors: Thomas C. Sprenger, Markus H. Gross, Daniel Bielser, Tobias Strasser
Published at InfoVis, 1998

We present IVORY a newly developed, platform-independent framework for physics based visualization. IVORY is especially designed for information visualization applications and multidimensional graph layout. It is fully implemented in Java 1.1 and its architecture features client server setup, which allows us to run the visualization even on thin clients. In addition, VRML 2.0 exports can be viewed by any VRML plugged-in WWW browser. Individual visual metaphors are invoked into IVORY via an advanced plug-in mechanism, where plug-ins can be implemented by any experienced user. The configuration of IVORY is accomplished using a script language, called IVML. Some interactive visualization examples, such as the integration of a haptic interface illustrate the performance and versatility of our system. Our current implementation supports NT 4.0.
LensBar-visualization for browsing and filtering large lists of data
Authors: Toshiyuki Masui
Published at InfoVis, 1998

The author proposes a simple and powerful graphical interface tool called the LensBar for filtering and visualizing large lists of data. Browsing and querying are the most important tasks in retrieving information and LensBar integrates the two techniques into a simple scroll window with slider. While it looks familiar to users of conventional graphical interface tools, its filtering and zooming features offer sophisticated handling of large lists of textual data.
Multi-faceted insight through interoperable visual information analysis paradigms
Authors: Elizabeth G. Hetzler, Paul Whitney, Lou Martucci, James J. Thomas
Published at InfoVis, 1998

To gain insight and understanding of complex information collections, users must be able to visualize and explore many facets of the information. The paper presents several novel visual methods from an information analyst's perspective. The authors present a sample scenario, using the various methods to gain a variety of insights from a large information collection. They conclude that no single paradigm or visual method is sufficient for many analytical tasks. Often a suite of integrated methods offers a better analytic environment in today's emerging culture of information overload and rapidly changing issues. They also conclude that the interactions among these visual paradigms are equally as important as, if not more important than, the paradigms themselves.
Reconfigurable disc trees for visualizing large hierarchical information space
Authors: Chang-Sung Jeong, Alex T. Pang
Published at InfoVis, 1998

We present a new visualization technique, called RDT (Reconfigurable Disc Tree) which can alleviate the disadvantages of cone trees significantly for large hierarchies while maintaining its context of using 3D depth. In RDT, each node is associated with a disc, around which its children are placed. Using discs instead of cones as the basic shape in RDT has several advantages: significant reduction of occluded region, sharp increase in number of displayed nodes, and easy projection onto plane without visual overlapping. We show that RDT can greatly enhance user perception by transforming its shapes dynamically in several ways: (1) disc tree which can significantly reduce the occluded region by the foreground objects; (2) compact disc tree which can increase the number of nodes displayed on the screen; and (3) plane disc tree which can be mapped onto the plane without visual overlapping. We describe an implementation of our visualization system called VISIT (Visual Information System for reconfigurable dIsc tree). It provides 2D and 3D layouts for RDT and various user interface features such as tree reconfiguration, tree transformation, tree shading, viewing transformation, animation, selection and browsing which can enhance the user perception and navigation capabilities. We also evaluate our system using the following three metrics: percentage of occlusion, density of displayed nodes on a screen, and number of identifiable nodes.
Saying it in graphics: from intentions to visualizations
Authors: Stephan M. Kerpedjiev, Giuseppe Carenini, Nancy L. Green, Johanna D. Moore, Steven F. Roth
Published at InfoVis, 1998

The authors propose a methodology for automatically realizing communicative goals in graphics. It features a task model that mediates the communicative intent and the selection of graphical techniques. The methodology supports the following functions: isolating assertions presentable in graphics; mapping such assertions into tasks for the potential reader, and selecting graphical techniques that support those tasks. They illustrate the methodology by redesigning a textual argument into a multimedia one with the same rhetorical and content structures but employing graphics to achieve some of the intentions.