(Part II) The creation of big data laboratories in archaeology, heritage and other disciplines to lead global digital initiatives is a growing trend at many universities. This full-day session is designed to bring together teams from laboratories and centers that are attempting to work with digital archaeological data and projects at a large scale, across a variety of applications and specialties. Moving from small-batch digital archaeology projects to larger projects and sets of interrelated projects is essential for archaeologists to fully benefit from the digital technologies and infrastructure that are continually emerging, and key to making real progress in addressing archaeological questions by using digital tools. This scaling up presents a new set of challenges. The aim of the session is to present and discuss the research directions taken by different groups, technical and organizational strategies, visions for pursuing funding and collaborations, and commonalities and differences. The initial participants in this session will include: • Herbert Maschner, Executive Director, Center for Virtualization and Applied Spatial Technologies (CVAST), University of South Florida. • Thomas Levy, Director, Center for Cyber-Archaeology and Sustainability, UC San Diego • Maurizio Forte, Director, Dig@Lab, Duke University • Ethan Watrall Associate Director of the Matrix Center for Digital Humanities & Social Sciences; Director of the Cultural Heritage Informatics Initiative, Michigan State University The session will take an unorthodox format, and will be divided into four sections. The first morning session will be presentations by the Center directors. The second morning session will be a series of presentations on specific projects within these centers by directors, research faculty, and research staff. These presentations will be followed in the afternoon by a forum led by the panel of lab directors, intended to create broad discussion. The forum will be followed by an early evening poster session and reception highlighting the lab projects with student participation in order to encourage open interaction and more detailed individual conversations. Anyone looking to get involved in digital archaeology, start a project, or expand one should attend this session.
