UALR Center A ‘Flight Simulator For Everything’

The new George W. Donaghey Emerging Analytics Center at the University of Arkansas at Little Rock will crunch enough data to create three-dimensional representations of construction projects, allow interns to practice surgical procedures, and make it easier to design projects such as the interiors of luxury jets.

As Gov. Mike Beebe described it during its unveiling Monday, it’s a “flight simulator for everything.”

Funded with a $5 million grant from the Donaghey Foundation, the center’s EmergiFLEX turns computations of enormous amounts of data into easily understandable three-dimensional visual representations.

The center is the world’s first with this combination of high-definition resolution and configurability. According to Chris Clover, Ph.D., president and CEO of manufacturer Mechdyne, only three or four systems worldwide have this level of resolution, while only a handful of other systems have this level of configurability, and none have this combination of both. Within minutes, three walls along with a floor screen can be moved to create a flat wall or a cave-like immersive room. Moreover, the system is unique in the amount of technology compacted into this size space.

Beebe announced the center along with UALR Chancellor Dr. Joel Anderson, Grant Tennille, director of the Arkansas Economic Development Commission, and others.

Wearing 3-D glasses with cameras that tracked his eye movements, Tennille displayed how the system would work in designing the interior of a Dassault Falcon Jet. A client could walk inside the plane, see the grain of the wood, and determine the fixtures. Dassault Falcon has already used the system to design the new hangar that will be used in its recently announced $60 million expansion.

Several others described other uses of the system. Southwest Power Pool demonstrated how the recent weather patterns in Oklahoma affected the power grid. Nabholz Construction Services walked through a cafeteria it built for the Southwest Power Pool. Dr. T. Glenn Pait, MD, demonstrated a human spine displayed across 30 feet of screen.

“You can walk through a jet engine and see the flow going through the turbines and the inlet, and then you can stretch it and watch as the flows change as you stretch it out,” said Dr. Eric Sandgren, dean of the George W. Donaghey College of Engineering and Information Technology.” It allows you to get inside the design to make changes and instantly see what happens when you make those changes.”

The center will be located on the fourth floor of the Donaghey building, but it’s not bound by those four walls. UALR also will operate a mobile version of the technology. Also, a mobile Double Robotics “Double Robot” allows collaborators to visit the EAC using a mobile screen that can be driven on wheels and is operated with an iPad application.

Other technology includes a force feedback system enabling users to grip a handle and simulate physical sensations, which will be especially useful in applications such as practicing surgeries.

Dr. Mary Good, UALR special advisor to the chancellor for economic development and the project’s leader, said the college will work out a fee schedule for partners to use the technology. Good said the system will enable clients to save money. Change orders, for example, should be much rarer. “The end result of that is that I can do a construction job faster, better, and at less cost to the customer,” she said. “People will pay for that.”

Good said the genesis of the program began when the Donaghey Foundation approached the school saying it had money available to do something big but would only fund a “game-changer” and would not pay for bricks and mortar. UALR had experience in the field – it had been operating a three-dimensional Virtual Reality Center since 2001 and created the first Information Quality program in the United States – and knew where the technology was headed, so it contacted MechDyne to ask what it could accomplish.

The university will be assisted by the UALR EAC Data Science Advisory Board, a national team of advisors in a variety of fields.