Experimental Geography Based on Virtual GeographicEnvironments(VGEs)

Objective In recent years,the structure and functions of Virtual Geographic Environments(VGEs)have become clearer and how they could be used to support geographic analysis and geographic experi-ment has received serious attention.Based on the analysis of the characteristics of geographic experi-ments,this paper discusses the potential contributions of VGEs to traditional geographic experimenta-tion,thus to encourage researchers to perform geographic experiments based on VGEs in a fused real-ity-virtuality and collaborative way.