A nanoMicroscopy webLab facilitating
variable size and time scale adventures in group

Adobe's newly released Atmosphere v1.0 only runs under w98 or later with Internet Explorer. If you are so equipped, here is a link to an Adobe PhotoShop Album/Atmosphere nanomicroscopy lounge, with some of our favorite images. The version of our (3+1)D avatar-enabled web-LAB, which is open to the general public but still in need of some updating, is [HERE]*. Other extreme physics Atmosphere links may be found here. Even without Atmosphere you might enjoy a visit to our applet-based nanomicroscopy explorer. For those interested (or already involved) in developing concordant links, and/or interested in versions of this site which are "dedicated" e.g. to participants in a particular course, contact us by e-mail at staff@newton.umsl.edu.

* Note: If the Atmosphere Plug-in does not load after a few minutes, and there is only a blank screen, Adobe suggests downloading the viewpoint/atmosphere minimal installer, running it, and then trying again. A version of the lab for pre 8/12/2002 browsers may be found here.

From there a bit of exploration might lead you, for example, to the inside of an electron microscope column, onto the surface of some atomic force microscope specimens, into our cubic lattice workshop where you can try describing how lattices differ in your own terms, and to our silicon defect prototyping area where allies and adversaries of gigascale integrated circuit manufacture can be observed in vivo without the "flattening effects" of transmitted electron contrast. In some cases you may need a navigation restart from the right hand panel after turning gravity off, if a solid floor is not available or you walk off the edge of one. Also, expect bugs and glitches here or there, from us of course as well as from Adobe since the software is still in testing at least until January 2003.

One objective of the 3D construction here is ironically to facilitate "less mediated" experiences with natural phenomena, especially those occuring on size and/or time scales that are different from our own. Although for now most of the experiences are with models of natural environments, we expect that the future will allow interaction for example with real atoms (one at a time) through such interfaces as well. Suggestions are invited, as is information on links to "complementary construction". We hope to figure out ways to offer rewards to particularly observant explorers downstream, so visitors are encouraged to "take their Sherlock Holmes hat with them" when they explore and (hopefully) come back with questions and comments.

Also don't forget to "say hi" and in general show respect to other visitors that you run into while there. We hope that some pretty talented and knowledgeable guests will grace these environments from time to time (even if their outward appearance is that of Adobe's default avatar "tester"). If you are interested in tagging along on guided tours through the various fields of adventure, send us an e-mail or check back here later for a schedule. The number of visitors to any given world is I think limited to 20 at a time. We hope that you can expect major changes in functionality (hopefully for the better as far as file size, graphics acceleration, and interaction physics is concerned) in the months ahead. However, don't hold your breath for gravitational ray-tracing in the immediate future even though traversible wormholes (describable with a very simple metric) might serve as excellent paths from one world to the next.

Snapshots from recent visits below show...

A way to make your blueprints come to life...

A talking mouse sitting on the lightbox...

what a pencil looks like if you are 2 cm tall...

evidence that some microscopy labs are fairly portable... (4 pi [sr] panorama credit to Helmut Dersch)

looking for flaws on the inside of an electron microscope column...

...and the outside as well... (e.g. scout for apertures and electrons in our 7.71 MB QuickTime TEMtrek.)

some important gigascale integrated circuit silicon defects in 3D...

conversation in an etched alpha recoil track pit on a freshly cleaved mica surface...

A walkthrough path for the Spring 2002 Central States Microscopy and MicroAnalysis Society Lab Tour...

how other cubic lattices look from an fcc perspective...

our fastrack lab for exploring anyspeed motion on your own... (Full-Sky Milky-Way credit to Axel Mellinger)

and waiting for colleagues before heading off on an adventure... (another panorama credit to Helmut Dersch)


Copyright Information: The panoramas (and other objects) seen in the snapshots here will only be used in "live and generally accessible" worlds with permission from the copyright holder, even if they are freely available on the web. This page also contains excerpts from work in progress involving numerous collaborators. Beyond this, one may consider the contents of the weblab and this page Copyright P. Fraundorf (2001,2002) UM-StL Physics and Astronomy.


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