Abstract: Rapid technology development leads to new direction of mineralogy exploration and teaching involving visualization and interaction of geological big data. Further exploration is needed on how to visualize and interact with the voluminous and complex geological big data which have no apparent logical structures. We have studied the 3D immersive visualization and interaction method for multi-scale geological data based on virtual reality (VR) and recognize the method is consistent with computational thinking and geological theory. In this paper, we first propose a theoretic framework for the multi-scale geological data visualization method. Next, we apply this method to visualize the multi-scale/multi-resolution geological data based on VR technology. Finally, we construct the 3D immersive VR platform and validate the method using actual data. We present here a new approach in visualization and interaction of geological data, as well as in scientific quantitative evaluation, analysis and teaching, illustrating an inevitable future development trend.

Key words: VR, multi-scale model, geological data, immersion, visualization, interactive