Pendulum Finds Virtual Soulmate

What's nerdier than creating an online avatar that fights dragons and raids strongholds? Creating a virtual pendulum that you can sync up to your real-life pendulum. Leave it to physicists to do just that, resulting in a mixed reality state in which the two pendulums swing as one.

Vadas Gintautas and Alfred Hübler of the Center for Complex Systems Research at the University of Illinios are the first to create a linked virtual/real system. They achieved the feat by connecting a real world pendulum with a virtual version that moved under time-tested equations of motion. To get the two pendulums to communicate, the physicists fed data about the real pendulum to the virtual one, and transferred information from the virtual pendulum to a motor that influenced the motion of the real pendulum.

The real and virtual pendulums swung at different rates when they were first introduced. After a brief encounter in a dual reality state, they simply couldn't connect. Friction quickly brought them to a halt. Recognizing that these two pendulums needed to have more in common, the physicists adjusted their swing frequencies until they were more or less on the same wavelength. Upon the next meeting, two pendulums could not help but move in mixed reality unison indefinitely, defying the friction forces that had ended their previous interreality relationship.

Believe it or not, their findings may prove useful. Mixed reality can occur only when the two systems are sufficiently similar. A system with unknown parameters may be synced up to a virtual system whose parameters are set by the physicists. The unknown factors in the real system can be determined by changing the virtual system until they shift from dual reality to mixed reality. Then, the physicists will have good estimates for the values of the unknown parameters.

What's more, it may help explore existing intersections between virtual realities and the material world. Popular online games such as World of Warcraft incorporate virtual economies in which players can buy, sell, and own property within the game. In the Warcraft economy, avatars deal in virtual gold, but the real players can buy it with real US dollars. Gintautas and Hübler are curious about the possibility of mixed realities emerging from these coupled economies.

Citation: Pendulum Finds Virtual Soulmate, Vadas Gintautas and Alfred W. Hübler, Physical Review E 75, http://link.aps.org/abstract/PRE/v75/e057201

Source: American Physical Society

Related stories:

Real and virtual pendulums swing as one in mixed reality state
Using a virtual pendulum and its real-world counterpart, scientists at the University of Illinois have created the first mixed reality state in a physical system. Through bidirectional instantaneous coupling, each pendulum “sensed” the other, their motions became correlated, and the two began swinging as one.
IBM builds online version of China's famed Forbidden City
IBM on Friday opened online doors to a virtual version of the famed Forbidden City in China that served for centuries as an exclusive realm for the nation's emperors.
California Scientists Demonstrate How to Use Advanced Fiber-Optic Backbone for Research
(PhysOrg.com) -- How can super-fast networking among research institutions in California help scientists make new discoveries? Researchers, campus administrators and networking infrastructure officials converged on the University of California, San Diego in September to find out.
Sony, Microsoft virtual communities to start
(AP) -- Video game rivals Sony and Microsoft are going head-to-head in virtual worlds for their home consoles later this year.
Mayo Clinic estimates new, tiny, super-sensitive probe could cut colon polyp removal in half
Based on results of a landmark study, researchers at Mayo Clinic's Florida campus see a future in which virtual biopsies will eliminate the need to remove colon polyps that are not cancerous or will not morph into the disease.
See what I see -- machines with mental muscle
(PhysOrg.com) -- The way we use and interact with machines is undergoing a profound change as computers are programmed to learn from experience and see more how we see. European research into machine learning is pushing back the boundaries of computer capabilities.
Light on the arms, wallet and speed
Chris Deutsch, a tech-savvy Minneapolis real estate agent, loves the mini-size netbook computer, but Shane O'Gorman, his counterpart in Eau Claire, Wis., doesn't.
Virtual world offers new locale for problem solving
Second Life, a virtual world created in 2003, currently boasts more than 12 million users worldwide who go there for everything from college recruiting to shopping. Now, Penn State researchers are investigating how virtual teams can better solve real world problems by collaborating in Second Life.

News discussion:

Physics news