This morning Robert Scoble unveiled video of Microsoft’s World Wide Telescope project in action. It’s definitely worth watching (even if Scoble’s camera work is as amateurish as ever), because though it didn’t bring me to tears, it does look like a pretty amazing piece of software. The purpose of the software is to provide access to the world’s collected astronomical data and put it in the hands of regular people. Similarly, the Visible Body, which launches tomorrow, aims to do the same for human physiology.
Created by Argosy Publications, an animation and illustration firm that specializes in medical and scientific animations, the Visible Body is a neat interactive web animation tool that lets users explore the human anatomy and all its various systems. Created by the company’s specially trained biomedical visualization engineers over the past few years, the Visible Body is an accurate portrayal of the human body that we’re told is already being used in classrooms.
In fact, the level of detail is to the degree necessary to teach a college-level Anatomy and Physiology course. The tool has already received some 145,000 sign-ups prior to its official launch tomorrow, including medical student, professors, and doctors.
It uses Flash and a browser plugin from computer aided drafting company Anark, which unfortunately means it only supports Internet Explorer and Windows. But those limitations aside, Visible Body is pretty slick. It’s easy to use and supports a whole range of visualizations for drilling into nearly any bodily system. Eventually, Argosy plans to add further layers for injury simulation, therapy information, etc. “Our next steps are to expand the Visible Body by adding different human models, medical pathology and therapy information, so that consumers can get a deeper understanding of their conditions and available treatments,” said Andrew Bowditch, President and CEO of Argosy in a press release.
It might not be as revolutionary as World Wide Telescope, but I’m guessing that learning about how the human body works and gaining free access to scientifically accurate and medical grade 3D visualizations has fairly universal appeal. The Visible Body has utility for educators, students, doctors, and patients, and is certainly worth checking out.
The video embedded below is an introduction to the Visible Body client via Argosy:
