As the need for STEM professionals continues to grow, encouraging young people into STEM fields is crucial. Technology is an efficient means to engage young audiences with learning, and recent advances in 3D visualisation technologies have impacted the approach to teaching many STEM subjects, including anatomy. Anatomy can be a challenging subject to teach children, and the use of novel digital visualisation technologies have been shown to help engage children with the subject material and improve knowledge acquisition.
The use of 3D holograms as an educational tool has recently begun to be explored. Hologram technology enables the creation of engaging content that provides the viewer with a 3-dimensional experience that can be seen directly with the naked eye. Without the need for headsets, more people can view and interact with the presented visualisations at once and the potential for user side effects which can arise with the use of headsets is removed. These features may make holography particularly beneficial in a range of environments, such as educational settings.
Although holographic technology shows great potential within anatomy education, cost has been identified as one of the main barriers to its use. As such, the development of cost-effective holographic approaches could help to remove the current financial barriers to this novel educational resource.
This project utilised innovative visualisation methods to develop a hologram-based anatomy application suitable for educational environments, which allows young audiences to interact with 3D anatomical models using a voice command system. This application runs on an easily reproducible, cost-effective holographic viewer, also developed during this project. These developments represent a step towards increased accessibility of holographic projection in anatomical education, with the aim of enhancing the engagement of young audiences with anatomy.