Visualization of 3-D wave propagation in the heart-a new technique

We present a new method, called differential volume rendering, to speed up the process of volume animation for flow visualization. Data coherency between consecutive simulation time steps is used to avoid casting unnecessary rays from the image plane. We illustrate the utility and speed of the differential volume rendering algorithm with simulation data from electrical wave propagation within a cellular automaton model of the ventricular myocardium. We can achieve considerable disk-space savings and nearly real-time rendering of 3-D how using low-cost, single processor workstations