CyberArchaeology: virtual reality and e-Science meets archaeology

• Grant number: 14/08418-7
• Support Opportunities: Research Grants - eScience and Data Science Program - Regular Program Grants
• Start date: January 01, 2015
• End date: June 30, 2017
• Field of knowledge: Physical Sciences and Mathematics - Computer Science - Computer Systems
• Principal Investigator: Marcelo Knorich Zuffo
• Grantee: Marcelo Knorich Zuffo
• Host Institution: Escola Politécnica (EP). Universidade de São Paulo (USP). São Paulo , SP, Brazil
• Associated researchers: Fernando Teubl Ferreira ; Maria Isabel D'Agostino Fleming ; Regis Kopper ; Roseli de Deus Lopes

Abstract

Cyber-archaeology is a new term to represent the natural evolution of archaeology, combining the state-of-the-art of the Virtual Archaeology with E-Science. Immersive Virtual Environments advances science and technology developments in data representation, interaction and analytical reasoning and reporting supported by computationally intensive and highly distributed network environments. This research project aims at a fully immersive interactive environment coupled with visual analytics/editing tools to explore archaeological worlds, harvested with modern archaeometry digital techniques and stored in distributed databases. Modern digital acquisition tools, such as laser scanners and image-based modeling, can generate massive amounts of 3D data in real time both in time and space. Despite the adoption of rigorous procedures, the archaeological excavation is a destructive process and once excavated, the physical site is no longer available as before. Under this perspective, fundamental scientific questions arise in the archaeological domain: how do we (re)think the material past? How can we record and transmit archeological information to future generations? Can this process be considered a time travel, a reconstruction or a simulation? The project objectives are: 1) to improve digital scanning techniques for archaeological excavations and artifacts exploring cloud-based storage methods for 3D big data; 2) to create interactive analytical tools for proper data mining in 3D big data and to build 3D realistic worlds. 3) to create Virtual Excavation Case Studies based on data harvested from archaeological sites in São Paulo State, Brazil, and at the Neolithic Site of Çatalhöyük, Turkey (whereas Duke University owns all the 3D datasets); 4) to explore collaboratively those virtual sites in fully immersive environments such as the DiVE at Duke and Caverna Digital at USP, 5) to promote the Second USP-Duke International Workshop in Cyber-archaeology to disseminate project results. (AU)