NARUPA
As molecular scientists have made progress in their ability to engineer nanoscale molecular structure, we face new challenges in our ability to engineer molecular dynamics (MD) and flexibility.
Dynamics at the molecular scale differs from the familiar mechanics of everyday objects because it involves a complicated, highly correlated, and three-dimensional many-body dynamical choreography which is often nonintuitive even for highly trained researchers. Interactive molecular dynamics in virtual reality (iMD-VR) can help to meet this challenge, enabling researchers to manipulate real-time MD simulations of flexible structures in 3D. In this project we outline various efforts to extend immersive technologies to the molecular sciences, and we introduce “Narupa,” a flexible, open-source, multiperson iMD-VR software framework which enables groups of researchers to simultaneously cohabit real-time simulation environments to interactively visualize and manipulate the dynamics of molecular structures with atomic-level precision.
Welcome to Narupa’s documentation!
Interact with molecules in virtual reality
Narupa lets you enter virtual reality and steer molecular dynamics simulations in real time. Explore rare events and try docking poses.
Use insightful visuals
Use python to control molecular representations.
Explore with others
Collaborate in a shared virtual space while sharing or not a physical space. Host a session in the cloud to share the experience with others across the world.
Customise your workflow
Narupa uses a customisable python server. Using the API you can integrate different physics engine and integrate Narupa into your existing workflow.
Narupa is free, open source and distributed under the GNU GPLv3 license. You can look at and contribute to the code for building server applications here, and our VR applications such as iMD-VR and Narupa Builder.
Citation
If you find Narupa useful, please cite the following paper:
Jamieson-Binnie, A. D., O’Connor, M. B., Barnoud, J., Wonnacott, M. D., Bennie, S. J., & Glowacki, D. R. (2020, August 17). Narupa iMD: A VR-Enabled Multiplayer Framework for Streaming Interactive Molecular Simulations. ACM SIGGRAPH 2020 Immersive Pavilion. SIGGRAPH ’20: Special Interest Group on Computer Graphics and Interactive Techniques Conference. https://doi.org/10.1145/3388536.3407891
WHY IS IT CALLED NARUPA?
Narupa combines the prefix 'nano' and suffix 'arupa'. Wikipedia explains how arūpa is a Sanskrit word describing non-physical and non-material objects. It seemed to us a good concept for describing what it's like to interact with simulated nanoscale objects in VR!