Oral surgeon Bernd Stadlinger, a professor at the University of Zurich’s Center of Dental Medicine, and biologist Reinhard Gruber, a professor at the Medical University of Vienna, have developed immersive materials to teach key biological and oral medicine basics. For example, the teaching film VR Osteoclasts, which was developed using virtual and augmented reality, shows in a completely new way how cells called osteoclasts break down bone tissue.
As the University of Zurich explains in a report, the film is based on a smartphone app called AR Osteoclasts: this was developed specifically for the teaching book Cell-to-Cell Communication: Cell Atlas – Visual Biology in Oral Medicine, which was written by the two scientists together with 45 other authors. The Game Technology Center at the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Zurich was responsible for the technological and artistic execution of this project. There are now a total of six computer-animated teaching videos to accompany the book, which visualize the interactions of the various cells in the human mouth.
“These technologies make the complex biology of bone remodeling more palpable and understandable,” says Stadlinger. “They make the invisible visible.” As he explains, the gaming industry is the driving force behind the powerful computers and graphics processing units that make this possible. He anticipates that these technologies will increasingly be used in research and surgical training in future, and points out that Zurich, with its universities and tech companies like Google and Disney, is providing the ideal environment for this new industry to emerge.
