Funding from the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation will support a project at the University of York (England) to find exciting new ways of making academic research material available online. The New York-based Foundation has awarded $250,000 to the study led by Professor Julian D Richards, Head of the Department of Archaeology and Co-Director of the online journal, Internet Archaeology.
     Professor Richards is examining ways of using the benefits of online publication to allow researchers to link their work to related databases, video, audio and other information in a way that traditional paper-based formats do not allow. The latest research will build on work completed as part of an award-winning earlier project known as LEAP (Linking Electronic Archives and Publications) which was funded by the Arts and Humanities Research Council under its ICT Strategy programme. The primary goal of the new project - Making the LEAP II: A Transatlantic LEAP - is to support the publication of archaeological research from four North American projects in Internet Archaeology.
     The Vice-Chancellor of the University of York, Brian Cantor, said: "The University is honoured to receive the support of the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation for this project. The development of online journals that are linked to other information sources will be tremendously beneficial to the research community."
     Professor Richards said: "We're very excited about this project as it will allow us to work with North American archaeologists to create novel ways of publishing their research findings. It builds on the success of the original LEAP project, which won Best Archaeological Innovation and was highly commended in the Best ICT Project category at the 2008 British Archaeological Awards." The project will run until 31 March 2011.

Sources: The Universtity of York (21 November 2008), Yorkshire Post (25 November 2008)