Talk: Seeing the Milky Way from the Inside Out, in 3D

Presentation Date: Thursday, January 11, 2024
Location: Brugg-Windisch, Switzerland (FHNW Campus)

The new "LIVE" collaboration (see live-env.org) is creating open-source software environments that let anyone build "Linkable Interactive Visualization and Exploration" Environments. LIVE has a suite of demonstration projects across Astronomy, Biology, and Geographic Information Science (GIS). 

The collaboration creating LIVE includes the groups who create glue, Jupyter, and the Vega-Lite. The project is making it possible to intermix tools, typically in a browser, to create interfaces that range from fully-interactive "no interface" websites to command-line driven notebooks. Using LIVE, a developer or user: 1) selects a layout; 2) adds visualization tools as-needed; 3) accesses online and local data; 4) links data sets' shared attributes; 5) explores data sets using "linked views" where selecting points or regions in a plot highlights the related data in other open views; and 6) shares what they learn in interactive outputs ranging from interactive figures in a publication to augmented reality environments.

In this talk, I will explain LIVE's history and goals.  I will highlight "MilkyWay3D.org," which is creating an open-science resource for studying the 3-dimensional structure of our Milky Way galaxy using LIVE-Astro.  I will also demonstrate the transferability of LIVE's components with views of additional applications in Biology and GIS.