Gary R. Bertoline is a Professor in the Department of Computer Graphics Technology at Purdue University , Assistant Dean for Graduate Studies, and Co-Director of the Envision Center for Data Perceptualization . From 1995 through 2002, Gary served as Department Head of Computer Graphics Technology at Purdue University .

He received the Ph.D. degree in technology from The Ohio State University in 1987, MEd from Miami University , and BS degree from Northern Michigan University . Prior to joining the faculty at Purdue, he served three years as a faculty member in the College of Engineering and Department of Engineering Graphics at The Ohio State University. He is currently a member of Epsilon Pi Tau , SIGGRAPH, American Society for Engineering Education (ASEE), and IEEE. 

In 1997 he received the Laureate Citation from Epsilon Pi Tau , the international honorary for professions in technology. Gary has been honored with the Frank Oppenheimer Award for the best paper at the EDGD Mid-Year Meeting three times. In 1995 Gary was nominated and elected as the inaugural Steven M. Slaby International Award for Outstanding Contributions to Graphics Education. In 1993 he was awarded the Centennial Certificate of Recognition for providing exemplary support to the ASEE. In 1992, Gary was named the Orthogonal Award winner by North Carolina State University 's Department of Graphics Communications for distinguished service in graphics science. In 1990, Gary was named to the Steering Committee for the International Society for Geometry and Graphics. 

Gary has presented over 100 papers at professional conferences in North America, Australia , and Europe . He has authored numerous papers in journals and trade publications on engineering and computer graphics, CAD, and visualization research. His research interests are in virtual reality and measuring and improving spatial cognition in humans. He has authored and co-authored eight text books in the areas of computer-aided design and engineering design graphics. Currently, Gary is the engineering and technical graphics series advisor for McGraw Hill Publishing Company . Gary serves on the Journal for Geometry and Graphics , Journal of Terrestrial Observation, and has served on the Board of Review for The Engineering Design Graphics Journal . 

Nationally and internationally, the candidate has served in a number of roles including the planning committee that led to the formation of the International Society for Geometry and Graphics , elected Chair of the Engineering Design Graphics division of the American Society for Engineering Education (ASEE), and is serving on the NSF-funded TeraGrid Executive Steering Committee and co-pi for the Purdue Resource Provider site.

Expertise and Research Interests

Dr. Bertoline's research interests are in applying computer graphics, immersive interactive environments, and virtual reality to visualize, interact, and analyze engineering and scientific data and information. Advances in computing platforms and instrumentation techniques have resulted in an exponential growth of data. Efficient interpretation of this data is fast emerging as a key-challenge in science, engineering, and business. The human-computer interface has emerged as a major information bottleneck: computer speeds increase, but human comprehension does not. Novel techniques must therefore be developed to effectively utilize the information capacity available to human comprehension.

In the real-world, humans have the natural ability to perceive several things effectively through a combination of multiple sensory modes (such as visual, haptic , spatial, aural, verbal, aroma, etc.). Humans have an innate capability to seamlessly communicate, perceive, and interact (called multimodal interaction) with others and the environment using these models. Large scale immersive visualization systems provide good visual perception. Going beyond the human visual systems, haptic interaction add another dimension to the human experience when dealing with complex problems and research output. Haptic devises are used to physically interact with the data through force feedback mechanisms.

To provide natural and intuitive interface to the researcher, in addition to haptics ( for force feedback), other sensory modes such as 3-dimensional (3D) 6 degrees-of-freedom (DOF) input trackers ( for spatial tracking of hand and head position and orientation), gloves (for fingers gesture recognition), voice recognition (for speech input), synthesized speech/sound output (for acoustic feedback), can be interfaced with visualization displays. Several input and output modalities combined effectively with the visualization facilities will help researchers to interact- easily, naturally, and effectively- with their complex data sets and perceive new ideas that are not possible with these tools.

The goal is to integrate these technologies in to a perceptually coherent strategy to bring new insight for research and learning. The integration of this technology with our understanding of human cognition is the framework we call perceptualization to stress that the integrated whole is bigger that the sum of individual parts. Much of his work is being done through Purdue's Envision Center for Data Perceptualization research and development lab which is used for perceptualization research and the application of this technology to science, engineering, and business.

These same techniques and technologies can be applied to data visualization through the use of computer graphics and 3D display devices. Data or information visualization is the conversion of large data sets of non-physical information into a visual through the use of computer graphics. Data visualization can increase the comprehension of huge amounts of data and allows for the perception of emergent properties that were not anticipated.

Zecosystem is a framework for a cyber-infrastructure enabled learning ecosystem that is built on the fundamental premise that learning experiences of the future will be multi-sensory, engage multiple technologies and significant computational power invisibly, continuously , and will be completely engaging . Zecosystem is the complementary convergence framework of pedagogy, cyberinfrastructure , and social-behavioral sciences to create a student lifestyle oriented neural learning environment . Instead of treating technology as an add-on component for teaching and learning, this framework calls for a fundamental, systematic, pro-active, and bottom-up approach to the use of emerging technologies in teaching and learning. This research is engaged in the development of the cyberinfrastructure and learning materials necessary to systemically change STEM teaching and learning.