Haptic navigation along filiform neural structures

Neural connections in the brain are arranged in dense, complex networks of filiform (i.e. thread-like) structures. Navigation along complex filiform networks entails problems including path following, path selection at complex branching nodes, and the combination of large-scale with fine-scale exploration. This work proposes haptic interaction techniques to aid in the navigation along such complex filiform structures. It introduces a constraint-based path following approach with smooth node transition and intuitive branch selection during fine-scale exploration, as well as user-friendly camera control and visual aids for large-scale exploration. We demonstrate the successful application of these techniques to the analysis and understanding of dense neural networks.