Agility Robotics geht an die Nasdaq: Was die Robotik-Debatte über 3D-Datenvisualisierung lehrt

Agility Robotics, a US leader in providing humanoid robots, has gone public on the Nasdaq exchange. This move invites a critical examination of the humanoid robot market. The article discusses a technical issue often overlooked in the bioinformatics field: why are high-dimensional structural data rendered in a two-dimensional viewport?

PDB files, which contain explicit coordinates, B-factors, occupancies, and multiple models, are reduced to an orthographic projection with rotation on the screen. This significant information reduction hinders spatial understanding of chiralities, pocket geometry, steric conflicts, and the relative position of secondary structure elements.

Even docking results are difficult to scrutinize due to this 2D representation. The article introduces NexoPeek, a virtual reality (VR) laboratory for studying proteins in human scale. It features three layers: guided tours, a PDB viewer, and an analysis bank. The PDB viewer allows users to see proteins in their true size from various perspectives and manipulate structures using hand gestures or controllers.

The analysis bank includes AI-based ligand prediction, homolog search, ligand inspector, and room view, which projects the molecule into the real world while keeping the menu accessible. The author emphasizes that VR does not solve the rendering problem but addresses the interaction issue, which is crucial for understanding rather than just rendering.

The article concludes by urging a similar critical approach to tools used in understanding structures that have democratized protein structure data through AlphaFold, like NexoPeek.