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- Uncovering ancient history: USF team discovers 2,000-year-old Roman house during excavation in Malta

A team of researchers and six students from the University of South Florida have discovered a centuries-old house in exceptional condition during an excavation in Malta, a country located in the Mediterranean Sea. Led by Davide Tanasi, professor and director of USF’s Institute for Digital Exploration (IDEx), USF students collaborated with a team of scientists from around the world on the Melite Civitas Romana Project, uncovering what life was like 2,000 years ago when Romans ruled Malta and the island was used for military staging and maritime trade.  Nestled in the heart of the ancient city of Melite, the once lavishly decorated mansion, traditionally known as Roman Domus, had been covered by centuries of soil. “In use between the 1st century BCE and 2nd century CE, the Domus was elegantly decorated with mosaic floors, wall frescoes and marble decorations,” Tanasi said. “During the Roman Empire, it was certainly used as a residence by a representative of the emperor or some very wealthy individual very close to the imperial court.”  After a summer of digging, processing and cleaning artifacts of the Roman Domus, the team discovered a portion of a previously unknown house adjacent to the domus with nearly 10-foot-tall walls, a height Tanasi says is unheard of for the Roman residential units usually found in the Mediterranean area.

July 26, 2023

- Digitizing Memories: The Virtualization of the Japanese-American Internment Camp Amache

The Granada War Relocation Center – also known as the Amache Camp – was one of ten Japanese-American internment camps that opened across the United States in 1942 as a response to the Pearl Harbor bombing. It was built one mile southwest of the town of Granada, and the area designated to house internees spanned one square mile. Internees were only allowed to bring one suitcase per person. Anything that couldn’t fit in the suitcase was left behind. To contribute to keeping alive the memories of what happened at the Amache Camp, which recently become part of the National Park System, a tema of the University of South Florida's Institute for Digital Exploration (IDEx) traveled to the site during the summer of 2022 with a singular goal in mind: to tell the story of the daily life of the internees and to make this story more accessible to the public. Over the course of a week, various artifacts and features of the Amache Camp were 3D digitized using cutting-edge technologies. Some of these artifacts included objects made or used by the detainees, which are currently housed at the Amache museum. These items include furniture made on site, articles of clothing that were worn, and suitcases that would’ve held the belongings of internees as they arrived and left. These pieces will become a part of a digital online collection that will be available for public viewing

November 1, 2022