The Research and Application of Spatial Information Technology in Cultural Heritage Conservation — Case Study on Grand Canal of China

This work is part of a multidisciplinary research project, within the National Key Technology R&D Program, “The Research and Application of Spatial Information Technology for conservation of large-scale heritage sites”, developed in collaboration with archaeologists and researchers from the field of geoinfomatics and hydrology, which aims at the application of spatial information technology for cultural heritage conservation, especially the large-scale heritage sits, a case study on Grand Canal of China is carried out. This paper presents the principal achievements we have gotten and puts forward some challenging issuers accordingly. At first, the related definitions are discussed; and some successful cases are reviewed. After the review, an integrated framework for the application of spatial information technology in conserving cultural heritage is conceived, based upon analysis of whole conserving process, information transferring flow, and domain model. Then the content and framework of this research project are studied by the logic and technical structure. Some key methods involved are discussed subsequently; also the main results and new findings are investigated in details. Finally combing with the opinions from experts of cultural heritage conservation, this paper concludes the project’s established results objectively, and present the research plan in the future. The involved contents of this study could be found on http://geospatial.arch.tsinghua.edu.cn, a website developed for this project especially. * Corresponding author