A virtual reality extension for the Geant4 toolkit
Geant4 is a toolkit for simulating particle interactions in matter that is widely used in particle physics, nuclear physics, medical imaging, and astrophysics. At present, Geant4 visualizations are generally viewed on a conventional, two-dimensional computer display. To enhance immersion, we have developed G4VR, a virtual reality (VR) application that extends Geant4 with VR capabilities, providing a more intuitive and comprehensive way to understand these interactions. The user running G4VR in a headset can get detailed information about individual tracks, interactions, and energy depositions by selecting them with the hand controllers. G4VR also allows the user to examine the chronology of interactions, and includes animations of entire events as immersive movies. G4VR includes built-in event displays of several types that allow a first-time user to easily explore its various functionalities. To interface with Geant4, we have developed a new visualization driver called G4XR that allows direct integration with the Geant4 source code. This enables any Geant4 experiment to be loaded and experienced in VR seamlessly.