The Impact of Modern Graphics Tools on Science, and their Limitations

Within the last few years the range of scientific applications for which computer graphics is used has become extremely large. However, not all scientists require the same level of computing power.Until recently the software interface to graphics display systems has been provided by the manufacturers of the hardware. This generated interest in the possibility of using graphics standards. Another important issue is related to the deluge of data generated by super-computers and high-volume data sources which make it impossible for users to have an overall knowledge of either the data structures or the application programs. Partial solutions can be found in emerging products providing an interactive computational environment for scientific visualization.Some of the characteristics required for graphics hardware are presented. From a hardware perspective, graphics computing involves the use of a graphical computer system with sufficient power and functionality that the user can manipulate and interact with displayed objects. To achieve such a level of performance computers are usually designed as networked workstations with access to local graphics capabilities. Finally, it is made clear that the main computer graphics applications are scientific activities. From high energy physics experiments with wireframe event displays up to medical imaging with interactive volume rendering, scientific visualization is not simply displaying data from data intensive sources. Fields of computer graphics like image processing, computer aided design, signal processing and user interfaces provide tools helping researchers to understand and steer scientific computation.