Immersive sonification of protein surface

This paper presents our ongoing efforts to design an immersive sonification model to represent protein surfaces through 3D sound, in order to extend pre-existing protein visualisation methods without overloading visual perception. The protein surface is first discretized so each point of the surface is attached to a sound source spatialized in such a way the user is immersed in the center of the protein. We add a spherical filtering system, that the user can control, to select the surface points that would be rendered in order to reinforce the auditory interpretation of the 3D shape. Several questions, which can benefit the VR and HCI communities, are discussed both on audio and audiographical filtering consistency, and on multimodal integration of data coming from different point of view and point of listening in a 3D interactive space.