Iscte - KI creates the country’s first laboratory for the digitisation and advanced visualisation of historical archives.
The DAViD Lab will be equipped with the technology and capacity to register and process the country’s historical archives.
28/07/25
Iscte - Knowledge and Innovation creates the country’s first laboratory for the digitisation and advanced visualisation of historical archives.
A collaboration protocol was signed between Iscte Knowledge and Innovation and the IMT – Institute for Mobility and Transport for the digitisation of the historical archive through the Laboratory for Data Digitisation and Advanced Visualisation. The DAViD Lab will be equipped with the technology and capacity to register and process the country’s historical archives. DAViD Lab will feature advanced technologies for interactive, multimodal, and immersive data visualisation, offering user experiences that include augmented reality (AR) and virtual reality (VR) systems, as well as touch, biometric, gesture-, gaze-, movement-based, and natural language (spoken and written in European Portuguese and other languages) interfaces.
The laboratory will house high-end equipment such as 2D (A0, A3, A2) and high-precision 3D laser scanners, 3D geometry capture cameras, high-resolution touch monitors, and AR/VR systems.
The IMT archive preserves documentation on the development of roads and railways in Portugal dating back to the 19th century, but has never been open to the public. At the signing of the protocol, IMT presented objects to the public for the first time since the 19th century.
“The DAViD Lab will be a landmark in the preservation and democratisation of access to data of national interest. These archives preserve the country’s memory and represent an invaluable cultural heritage, which will finally be accessible to all.” Professor Jorge Costa
This laboratory represents an investment of €1.7 million, co-financed by the European Union through the Lisbon Regional Programme, within the framework of Portugal 2030.
