What is the Current Status of VSEM?
VSEM has been researched as a PhD project, and has reached the end of this phase of its development. Conceptual development and proof-of-concept work has been completed, demonstrating that the Virtual SEM is technologically viable. In addition, a significant amount of software development has been carried out in the following areas:
- SEM Simulator - a functional simulator has been written which demonstrates the use of real-time digital image filtering to reproduce the operation of a real SEM. A number of controls are reproduced including magnification, astigmatism correction, focus, brightness, contrast, stage panning and gun and electron beam parameter setting. In addition the simulator features various other features commonly found on a SEM such as sample feature measurement;
- SEM Encyclopaedia - the framework for this software is completely coded and functional. It contains a subset of the informational dataset intended for final inclusion;
- CMS System - two development and evaluation servers are currently running demonstration versions of the VSEM courseware under Moodle. One is accessible only via the University of Cambridge Department of Engineering computer network. The other (this one) is available for public access. We encourage interested parties to apply for a demonstration licence to try out the software.
Although the current phase of the project has been a success - fully validating the VSEM concept in general - we hope to continue research and development to remedy known shortcomings. Example work includes:
- Addition of new controls to the simulator in order to improve realism;
- Conversion of the content of an old encyclopaedia to Flash and XML formats, for inclusion in the new one;
- Development of the CMS to allow better integration of encyclopaedia and simulator within course content;
- Investigation of emerging web-based technologies with a view to applying them to VSEM (e.g. 3D VSEM?!).
Finally, we currently seek users to trial the existing software in order to obtain constructive feedback and allow us to develop it further.