Remote Sensing and GIS Training and Research for Iraqi Archaeologists

FAIN: PI-50019-05

SUNY Research Foundation, Stony Brook (Stony Brook, NY 11794-0001)
Elizabeth C. Stone (Project Director: June 2005 to April 2007)

An intensive training program for two faculty members each from Baghdad and Mosul Universities and two members of the Iraqi State Board of Antiquities and Heritage in remote sensing and geographic information systems (GIS).

This project focuses on a four-month training program in Remote Sensing and GIS for professional Iraqi archaeologists drawn from the State Board of Antiquities and Baghdad and Mosul Universities. The course will focus on the utility of these techniques for research, site protection and site management. By the end of the program, the faculty will have the skills to teach these materials on their return to Iraq. Coincident with the training program, we will survey archaeological sites in the key Nippur, Uruk and Eridu survey areas using recent high resolution Digital Globe imagery for evidence of site damage from looting and development, recording new sites, ancient landscape features and intra-site details.