[ti:New System May Let You Appear Someplace You Have Never Been] [ar:Mario Ritter] [al:Technology Report] [by:www.tingclass.com] [00:03.00]This is the VOA Special English [00:06.14]Technology Report. [00:08.18]A hologram is a three-dimensional image [00:12.72]-- an image that appears [00:15.21]to have height, width and depth. [00:18.84]More than thirty years ago, [00:21.68]Princess Leia gave her famous [00:24.47]holographic plea for help [00:26.95]in the original "Star Wars" movie. [00:29.84]Since then, holograms have become bigger, [00:33.82]better and more widely used. [00:36.76]Now, researchers have developed [00:40.34]a holographic telepresence system. [00:42.98]Traditional telepresence systems [00:46.31]are used in video conferencing. [00:49.30]They present two-dimensional images. [00:53.28]But the new system might be able to [00:57.36]send a moving 3-D image of a person [01:00.50]over great distances [01:02.44]-- and show it in close to real time. [01:06.57]Nasser Peyghambarian is the lead researcher [01:10.75]for the project at the University [01:13.54]of Arizona in Tucson. [01:15.54]He says holographic technology [01:18.67]can make people appear in places [01:21.31]where they have never been. [01:23.55]Nasser Peyghambarian: "People can see you [01:24.60]just the way you are [01:25.50]as if you've been there." [01:26.74]With the new system, [01:28.24]the image is refreshed so often [01:31.07]that it seems to look like [01:33.26]a person's natural movement. [01:35.10]An important part of the system [01:38.54]is a screen that can refresh [01:41.08]the holographic image every two seconds. [01:44.96]The screen is made from a special [01:48.09]photorefractive material. [01:50.24]In experiments, the researchers [01:53.58]placed sixteen cameras in a half-circle. [01:57.76]They took pictures of people [01:59.85]from different positions. [02:01.29]Then the researchers sent the images [02:04.47]to a different place over the Internet. [02:07.56]Lasers at the other end received [02:11.35]the pictures and produced holographs [02:14.09]on the screen. [02:15.28]Mr. Peyghambarian says [02:18.62]the new material permits the images [02:21.36]to be continually written, [02:23.70]erased and replaced. [02:26.39]Nasser Peyghambarian: "Every image [02:27.39]that you want to show only [02:29.48]takes two seconds to write it. [02:30.77]And therefore the next image [02:32.86]comes in after that. [02:33.81]And this capability allows [02:36.79]this system to be used for, [02:38.78]for example, telepresence [02:41.32]-- that an object in one location [02:43.66]now can be [virtually] transferred [02:45.75]or can be shown [02:47.14]in another location in 3-D." [02:48.74]He says the more cameras [02:51.22]and the more pictures that are used, [02:53.76]the more realistic [02:55.40]the holographic image appears. [02:57.35]The researchers imagine their technology [03:00.98]being used for things like 3-D maps [03:04.66]and movies requiring no special glasses. [03:08.84]Doctors could use it for telemedicine. [03:12.87]But the researchers say [03:15.02]their holographic telepresence system [03:17.51]is still years away from completion. [03:21.29]A report on the system [03:23.98]appeared in the journal Nature. [03:26.57]And that's the VOA Special English [03:30.00]Technology Report, [03:31.79]written by June Simms [03:33.59]with Jessica Berman. [03:35.73]You can learn about other new uses [03:38.91]for 3-D technology at tingclass.com. [03:44.38]You can also join us on Facebook [03:47.42]and Twitter at VOA Learning English. [03:52.20]We'll talk more about [03:54.54]telepresence systems next week. [03:56.97]I'm Mario Ritter.