Visualization of Astronomical Nebulae via Distributed Multi-GPU Compressed Sensing Tomography

The 3D visualization of astronomical nebulae is a challenging problem since only a single 2D projection is observable from our fixed vantage point on Earth. We attempt to generate plausible and realistic looking volumetric visualizations via a tomographic approach that exploits the spherical or axia...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:IEEE transactions on visualization and computer graphics 2012-12, Vol.18 (12), p.2188-2197
Main Authors: Wenger, S., Ament, M., Guthe, S., Lorenz, D., Tillmann, A., Weiskopf, D., Magnor, M.
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Astronomical instruments
Astronomical visualization
Compressed
Compressed sensing
Detection
direct volume rendering
distributed volume reconstruction
Graphics processing unit
Image reconstruction
Memory management
Nebulae
Projection
Reconstruction algorithms
Space telescopes
Symmetry
Three dimensional
Visualization
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Summary:The 3D visualization of astronomical nebulae is a challenging problem since only a single 2D projection is observable from our fixed vantage point on Earth. We attempt to generate plausible and realistic looking volumetric visualizations via a tomographic approach that exploits the spherical or axial symmetry prevalent in some relevant types of nebulae. Different types of symmetry can be implemented by using different randomized distributions of virtual cameras. Our approach is based on an iterative compressed sensing reconstruction algorithm that we extend with support for position-dependent volumetric regularization and linear equality constraints. We present a distributed multi-GPU implementation that is capable of reconstructing high-resolution datasets from arbitrary projections. Its robustness and scalability are demonstrated for astronomical imagery from the Hubble Space Telescope. The resulting volumetric data is visualized using direct volume rendering. Compared to previous approaches, our method preserves a much higher amount of detail and visual variety in the 3D visualization, especially for objects with only approximate symmetry.
ISSN:1077-2626
1941-0506
DOI:10.1109/TVCG.2012.281