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Groundbreaking worker-training system leverages virtual reality and multiuser haptics
A premier manufacturing facility, the Y-12 National Security Complex is dedicated to making the world a safer place.
Y-12 plays a vital role in the U.S. Department of Energy to help ensure a safe and effective nuclear weapons deterrent. Y-12 also retrieves and stores nuclear materials, fuels U.S. naval reactors, and performs complementary work for other government and private-sector entities. Since 1943, Y-12 has played a key role in strengthening our country’s national security and reducing the global threat from weapons of mass destruction.
Y-12 recently built a state-of-the-art training campus through a federal- and state-funded partnership in Oak Ridge, Tennessee, to provide first responder training that uses advanced technologies to demonstrate high-hazard, low-occurrence response scenarios: the Oak Ridge Enhanced Technology and Training Center (ORETTC), headed by Director Ashley Stowe.
Y-12 plays a vital role in the U.S. Department of Energy to help ensure a safe and effective nuclear weapons deterrent. Y-12 also retrieves and stores nuclear materials, fuels U.S. naval reactors, and performs complementary work for other government and private-sector entities. Since 1943, Y-12 has played a key role in strengthening our country’s national security and reducing the global threat from weapons of mass destruction.
Y-12 recently built a state-of-the-art training campus through a federal- and state-funded partnership in Oak Ridge, Tennessee, to provide first responder training that uses advanced technologies to demonstrate high-hazard, low-occurrence response scenarios: the Oak Ridge Enhanced Technology and Training Center (ORETTC), headed by Director Ashley Stowe.
The Situation
With a focus on performance excellence and the imperatives of safety, security, and zero defects, Y-12 implements glovebox equipment to handle dangerous materials. Y-12’s standard glovebox’s containment unit has one or more windows and two ports. These allow workers wearing protective, arm-length gloves to handle hazardous and sensitive material in a controlled environment.
Y-12 must teach people the skills and techniques to use these gloveboxes, which can be varied sizes and used to perform a variety of processes. Training is critically important, and a key part of the training challenge is replicating the realism of the strain without any of the dangers of hazardous materials.
As part of their continuous improvement endeavors, the ORETTC team decided to prototype a virtual glovebox training simulator.
Y-12 must teach people the skills and techniques to use these gloveboxes, which can be varied sizes and used to perform a variety of processes. Training is critically important, and a key part of the training challenge is replicating the realism of the strain without any of the dangers of hazardous materials.
As part of their continuous improvement endeavors, the ORETTC team decided to prototype a virtual glovebox training simulator.
Goal for Use
Training workers in high-hazard jobs can be a challenge. At Y-12’s Oak Ridge Enhanced Technology and Training Center, novel virtual reality training methods have removed some obstacles by placing trainees outside the hazard bubble and into virtual environments.
For the virtual glovebox training simulator, the Y-12 team aimed to prototype a digital environment in which users could handle and test dangerous materials, both independently and in multiuser training sessions for collaborative material-handling.
The project aims to evaluate the educational value of haptic feedback on the training time of the physical operations in a glove box.
For the virtual glovebox training simulator, the Y-12 team aimed to prototype a digital environment in which users could handle and test dangerous materials, both independently and in multiuser training sessions for collaborative material-handling.
The project aims to evaluate the educational value of haptic feedback on the training time of the physical operations in a glove box.
The Problem to Address
Gloveboxes present a challenge for hands-on training; some gloveboxes can serve as inert containers, filled with an inert gas such as nitrogen, argon, or helium. Others facilitate semi-sterile culture work. Training typically involves a student and trainer both using the same glovebox. In collaboration with ORETTC’s Instructional Designers, Evaluation Leads, and Instructional Technologists theorized that by using virtual reality, any glovebox configuration can be simulated for repeated training sessions.
However, the typical training process requires manual dexterity and ability to retain procedural and muscle memory; and it requires two operators to handle and pass materials to each other.
Until recently, no commercial tech supported multi-user haptics implementations within a single virtual environment.
With their fixed glove ports, gloveboxes also present strain and fatigue on users when used for an extended period. This strain also needs to be communicated in a realistic training environment.
Until recently, no commercial tech supported multi-user haptics implementations within a single virtual environment.
With their fixed glove ports, gloveboxes also present strain and fatigue on users when used for an extended period. This strain also needs to be communicated in a realistic training environment.
The Solution
Y-12’s ORETTC is a state-of-the-art location in which Emergency Response personnel train for various situations that could involve hazardous material. Facilities include augmented and virtual reality rooms for immersive training.
ORETTC Instructional Technology Lead Austin Arnwine, with support from ORETTC Senior Manager Mary Lin and ORETTC Director Ashley Stowe, devised an innovative solution: a virtual glovebox simulator.
By integrating haptics gloves in the virtual glovebox, Y-12 could provide realistic simulated tactile and force feedback; “The use of HaptX gloves in virtual training environments provides the user with the ability to build muscle memory, both mentally and physically,” according to Austin Arnwine.
Through the HaptX SDK and in collaboration with the University of Central Florida Modeling Simulation and Training Lab, this project has achieved multiuser haptics functionality to support collaborative haptic scenarios. This enables Y-12 to further improve the glovebox training experience using HaptX Gloves DK2 and the HaptX SDK to design training modules for use with HaptX Gloves G1. The developers are using HTC Vive headsets and tracking along with Steam VR to visualize the digital content in Unreal Engine.
Research Methods
Through significant study design and collaboration between ORETTC, Y-12, University of Central Florida, and HaptX, this project is set to better understand the validity of glovebox simulation technology in comparison to a real glovebox.
Familiarization Exercise: Within each glovebox condition (HaptX Gloves; joystick; and physical glovebox), participants will complete each of the busy-board tasks three times (zipper, buckle, latch 1, latch 2, chain lock, and switch).
Glovebox Task: After Recovery 1 is completed, the first glovebox task that includes a wrench task will begin. The wrench task will involve:
taking a canister and placing it into a compressed chamber of a glovebox
putting on the glovebox gloves
bringing the canister out of the compressed chamber
filling the canister with a closed vial
using a wrench to close the canister
placing the canister back into the compressed chamber
Glovebox Task: After Recovery 1 is completed, the first glovebox task that includes a wrench task will begin. The wrench task will involve:
Results
At this early prototype phase, the virtual glovebox research project is being evaluated for potential deployment, pending favorable results.
That time is coming. According to Y-12’s ORETTC Director Ashley Stowe, “Everything we do at ORETTC funnels technology through an educational lens so that we are using the correct technology in the correct way at the correct time to achieve the learning outcome we desire for our customers.”
In the meantime, HaptX and Y-12 have signed an agreement to collaborate on further development of the multiuser glovebox training simulation in support of the U.S. energy sector.
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