Section: Scientific Foundations

Physical modeling and simulation

The first aspect is the modeling and the simulation of the virtual world that represents properly the physical behavior of the virtual world that sustains a natural interaction through the different devices. The main challenge is the search of the trade-off between accuracy and performance to allow effective manipulation, in interactive time, by the user. This trade-off is a key point while the user closes the interaction loop. Namely, the accuracy of the simulation drives the quality of the phenomenon to perceive and the performance drives the sensori-motor feelings of the user. Proposing new controlled algorithms for physical based simulation of the virtual world is certainly a key point for meeting this trade-off. We believe that the mechanical behavior of objects as to be more studied and to be as close as possible to their real behavior. The devices may act as a both way filter on the action and on the perception of the simulated world, but improving the representation of rigid objects submitted to contact, of deformable objects, of changing state object and of environments that include mixed rigid and deformable objects is needed in order to compute forces and positions that have a physical meaning. The interaction between tools and deformable objects is still a challenge in assembly applications and in medical applications. The activity of the user in interaction with the immersive environment will allow to provide method to qualify the quality of the environment and of the interaction by proposing a bio-mechanical user's Alter Ego. We believe that the analysis of the forces involved during an immersive activity will give us keys to design more acceptable environments. As the goal is to achieve more and more accurate simulation that will require more and more computation time, the coupling between physical modeling and related simulation algorithms is of first importance. Looking for genericity will ensure correct deployment on new advanced hardware platforms that we will use to ensure adapted performance. The main aim of this topic is to improve the simulation accuracy satisfying the simulation time constraints for improving the naturalness of interactions.