Evaluation of an Augmented-Reality-based 3D User Interface to Enhance the 3D-Understanding of Molecular Chemistry

Patrick Maier, Gudrun Klinker

2013

Abstract

The spatial understanding of chemical molecules is crucial for learning chemistry at school. With a good 3D understanding of molecules, chemical processes become obvious compared to a 2D representation in textbooks or just the molecular formula. With the increasing spread of computers, smartphones and tablets, the field of computer aided learning becomes more and more important. Common molecular viewers such as Jmol present chemical simulations as 3D renderings on a regular computer screen in combination with desktop-based user interfaces using a mouse and a keyboard to manipulate 3D molecules. Such interfaces may be cumbersome to use since users have to associate 2D mouse motion and key presses with 3D object motions. In this paper we investigate the hypothesis that the understanding of spatial structures of molecules is enhanced by Augmented-Reality-based 3D user interfaces with which students can directly manipulate the virtual 3D molecules by freely moving and rotating a 3D object in air with their hands. Our results show that a direct manipulation 3D user interface improves the 3D understanding in comparison to the traditional desktop-based user interface with mouse and keyboard.

References

  1. Arnold, O., Fujima, J., Jantke, K. P., and Tanaka, Y. (2012). Exploring and understanding the abstract by direct manipulation of the concrete. In CSEDU (2), pages 100-107.
  2. Chen, M., Mountford, S., and Sellen, A. (1988). A study in interactive 3-d rotation using 2-d control devices. In ACM SIGGRAPH Computer Graphics, volume 22, pages 121-129. ACM.
  3. Fjeld, M., Fredriksson, J., Ejdestig, M., Duca, F., Bö tschi, K., Voegtli, B., and Juchli, P. (2007). Tangible user interface for chemistry education: comparative evaluation and re-design. In Proceedings of the SIGCHI conference on Human factors in computing systems, pages 805-808. ACM.
  4. Herman, T., Morris, J., Colton, S., Batiza, A., Patrick, M., Franzen, M., and Goodsell, D. (2006). Tactile teaching: Exploring protein structure/function using physical models*. Biochemistry and Molecular Biology Education, 34(4):247-254.
  5. Hinckley, K., Tullio, J., Pausch, R., Proffitt, D., and Kassell, N. (1997). Usability analysis of 3d rotation techniques. In Proceedings of the 10th annual ACM symposium on User interface software and technology, pages 1-10. ACM.
  6. Hoyek, N. E., Collet, C., Guillot, A., Thiriet, P., and Sylvestre, E. (2011). Experimental research validation for the use of 3d in teaching human anatomy. In Verbraeck, A., Helfert, M., Cordeiro, J., and Shishkov, B., editors, CSEDU (2), pages 225-227. SciTePress.
  7. Jmol (2012). Jmol: an open-source Java viewer for chemical structures in 3D. http://www.jmol.org/.
  8. Johnson, E. M., Khoo, E., Cowie, B., de Lange, W., and Torrens, R. (2011). Ict/ elearning for developing visual spatial thinking in university science teaching. In CSEDU (2)7811, pages 73-78.
  9. Kato, H. and Billinghurst, M. (1998). Marker tracking and hmd calibration for a video-based augmented reality conferencing system. In 2nd IEEE and ACM International Workshop on Augmented Reality (IWAR 99), pages 85-94.
  10. Maier, P., Tö nnis, M., and Klinker, G. (2009a). Augmented Reality for teaching spatial relations. In CD-ROM Proceedings from the Conference of the International Journal of Arts and Sciences. ISSN: 1943-6114.
  11. Maier, P., Tö nnis, M., and Klinker, G. (2009b). Dynamics in Tangible Chemical Reactions. In Proceedings from the International Conference on Chemical Engineering (ICCE 2009). ISSN: 2070-3724.
  12. McNaught, A. and Wilkinson, A. (1997). Compendium of chemical terminology, volume 1669, chapter Lewis formula (electron dot or Lewis structure), page 1135. Blackwell Science Oxford, UK.
  13. Panagiotopoulos, C. G., Manolis, G. D., and Athanatopoulou, A. (2012). Edusoft package for structural engineering - web-based educational material using java for structural dynamics. In Helfert, M., Martins, M. J., and Cordeiro, J., editors, CSEDU (2), pages 299-303. SciTePress.
  14. Pustka, D., Huber, M., Waechter, C., Echtler, F., Keitler, P., Newman, J., Schmalstieg, D., and Klinker, G. (2011). Automatic configuration of pervasive sensor networks for augmented reality. IEEE Pervasive Computing, 10(3):68-79.
  15. Zhai, S. (1998). User performance in relation to 3d input device design. ACM Siggraph Computer Graphics, 32(4):50-54.
Download


Paper Citation


in Harvard Style

Maier P. and Klinker G. (2013). Evaluation of an Augmented-Reality-based 3D User Interface to Enhance the 3D-Understanding of Molecular Chemistry . In Proceedings of the 5th International Conference on Computer Supported Education - Volume 1: CSEDU, ISBN 978-989-8565-53-2, pages 294-302. DOI: 10.5220/0004349502940302


in Bibtex Style

@conference{csedu13,
author={Patrick Maier and Gudrun Klinker},
title={Evaluation of an Augmented-Reality-based 3D User Interface to Enhance the 3D-Understanding of Molecular Chemistry},
booktitle={Proceedings of the 5th International Conference on Computer Supported Education - Volume 1: CSEDU,},
year={2013},
pages={294-302},
publisher={SciTePress},
organization={INSTICC},
doi={10.5220/0004349502940302},
isbn={978-989-8565-53-2},
}


in EndNote Style

TY - CONF
JO - Proceedings of the 5th International Conference on Computer Supported Education - Volume 1: CSEDU,
TI - Evaluation of an Augmented-Reality-based 3D User Interface to Enhance the 3D-Understanding of Molecular Chemistry
SN - 978-989-8565-53-2
AU - Maier P.
AU - Klinker G.
PY - 2013
SP - 294
EP - 302
DO - 10.5220/0004349502940302