The AlloSphere, a 30-foot diameter sphere built inside a 3-story near-to-anechoic (echo free) cube, allows for synthesis, manipulation, exploration and analysis of large-scale data sets in an environment that can simulate virtually real sensorial perception. It is a physical place designed to facilitate creativity and incubate ideas via collaboration. Researchers find a multitude of interactive interfaces for research into: scientific visualization, numerical simulations, data mining, visual/aural abstract data representations, knowledge discovery, systems integration, human perception, and many other areas of inquiry.

The main research/presentation space consists of a three-story, near-to-anechoic room containing a custom-built close-to-spherical screen, ten meters in diameter. The sphere environment integrates visual, sonic, sensory, and interactive components.

The space surrounding the spherical screen is close to cubical, with an extra control/machine room in the outside corner. The space is painted black so as to minimize any distracting light reflections. Room air handling has been designed to minimize background noise. The whole outer space is treated with sound absorption material (4-foot wedges on almost all inner surfaces), forming a quasi-anechoic chamber of large proportion. Mounted inside this chamber are two 5-meter-radius hemispheres, constructed of perforated aluminum that is designed to be optically opaque (with low optical scatter) and acoustically transparent.