RI: Medium: Universal Deformable Shape Models with Varying Skeletal Structures

NSF Award Search · 01002526DB NSF RESEARCH & RELATED ACTIVIT · $1,200,000 · view on nsf.gov ↗

Abstract

Understanding the three-dimensional (3D) structure of animals and humans from everyday images and videos is essential for a wide range of real-world applications - from analyzing animal motion in biological research to planning surgeries for children with variations in hand anatomy. This project supports the development of a new class of digital shape models capable of accurately representing deformable objects like animal bodies and human hands, even when their internal skeletal structures deviate from the norm. Unlike existing models that rely on a fixed skeleton, this project enables adaptive, learnable models that can accommodate diverse and atypical anatomies. By supporting flexible modeling across a broad spectrum of species and conditions, this work has the potential to advance research in biology, medicine, and education. The project includes plans for public release of tools and datasets, along with educational outreach involving students and domain experts. The research will develop a universal deformable shape modeling framework that integrates data from 3D scans, images, and videos to handle objects with varied skeletal topologies. The research includes three main thrusts: (1) learning mesh-based and implicit shape generators with disentangled latent representations for object type, shape, and pose; (2) constructing bone-driven shape priors that generalize to previously unseen skeletal structures, enabling modeling of rare or pathological forms; and (3) applyin

Key facts

NSF award ID
2504906
Awardee
University of Texas at Austin (TX)
SAM.gov UEI
V6AFQPN18437
PI
Georgios Pavlakos
Primary program
01002526DB NSF RESEARCH & RELATED ACTIVIT
All programs
ROBUST INTELLIGENCE, MEDIUM PROJECT
Estimated total
$1,200,000
Funds obligated
$1,200,000
Transaction type
Standard Grant
Period
07/01/2025 → 06/30/2029