During the last decades, anatomy has become an interesting topic in education---even for laymen or schoolchildren. As medical imaging techniques become increasingly sophisticated, virtual anatomical education applications have emerged. Still, anatomical models are often preferred, as they facilitate 3D localization of anatomical structures. Recently, data physicalizations (i.e., physical visualizations) have proven to be effective and engaging---sometimes, even more than their virtual counterparts. So far, medical data physicalizations involve mainly 3D printing, which is still expensive and cumbersome. We investigate alternative forms of physicalizations, which use readily available technologies (home printers) and inexpensive materials (paper or semi-transparent films) to generate crafts for anatomical edutainment. To the best of our knowledge, this is the first computer-generated crafting approach within an anatomical edutainment context. Our approach follows a cost-effective, simple, and easy-to-employ workflow, resulting in assemblable data sculptures (i.e., semi-transparent sliceforms). It primarily supports volumetric data (such as CT or MRI), but mesh data can also be imported. An octree slices the imported volume and an optimization step simplifies the slice configuration, proposing the optimal order for easy assembly. A packing algorithm places the resulting slices with their labels, annotations, and assembly instructions on a paper or transparent film of user-selected size, to be printed, assembled into a sliceform, and explored. We conducted two user studies to assess our approach, demonstrating that it is an initial positive step towards the successful creation of interactive and engaging anatomical physicalizations.

中文翻译：

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切片和切块：解剖学教育的物理化工作流程

在过去的几十年里，解剖学已经成为教育中一个有趣的话题——即使对于外行或学童也是如此。随着医学成像技术变得越来越复杂，出现了虚拟解剖教育应用。尽管如此，解剖模型通常是首选，因为它们有助于解剖结构的 3D 定位。最近，数据物理化（即物理可视化）已被证明是有效且引人入胜的——有时甚至比它们的虚拟对应物还要多。到目前为止，医疗数据物理化主要涉及3D打印，这仍然昂贵且繁琐。我们研究物理化的替代形式，这些形式使用现成的技术（家用打印机）和廉价材料（纸或半透明薄膜）来制作解剖学寓教于乐的工艺品。据我们所知，这是第一个在解剖寓教于乐的背景下由计算机生成的制作方法。我们的方法遵循具有成本效益、简单且易于使用的工作流程，从而产生可组装的数据雕塑（即半透明切片）。它主要支持体积数据（如 CT 或 MRI），但也可以导入网格数据。八叉树对导入的体积进行切片，优化步骤简化了切片配置，提出了易于组装的最佳顺序。打包算法将生成的切片连同它们的标签、注释和组装说明放置在用户选择尺寸的纸或透明薄膜上，以进行打印、组装成切片形式并进行探索。我们进行了两项用户研究来评估我们的方法，