Real-time simulation of deformable objects: tools and application

Presents algorithms for animating deformable objects in real time. We focus on computing the deformation of an object subject to external forces and detecting collisions among deformable and rigid objects. The targeted application domain is surgical training. This application relies more on visual realism than exact, patient-specific deformation, but requires that computations be performed in real time. This is in contrast with pre-operative surgical planning, where computations may be done offline but must provide accurate results. To achieve real-time performance, the proposed algorithms take advantage of the fact that most deformations are local, human-body tissues are well damped, and motions of surgical instruments are relatively slow. They have been integrated into a virtual reality system for simulating the suturing of small blood vessels (microsurgery).