Project founded by UVA alumus Dr. Justin Walsh recognized in "Popular Science"

The International Space Station Archaeological Project, established by UVA alumnus Dr. Justin Walsh, was recently featured in an article by Popular Science.

Dr. Justin Walsh (professor at Chapman University) is a leading scholar in the new field of space archaeology, which studies the material culture of human activity in outer space and human activity on Earth that is directed at space. He was selected as a member of the Explorer Club 50 in 2024, one of “50 remarkable explorers changing the world and extending the meaning of exploration.”

In 2015, Dr. Walsh the first archaeological effort to investigate a human habitat in space, the International Space Station Archaeological Project, and he has co-directed ISSAP since then. In 2022, ISSAP carried out the first archaeological work in space, an experiment called SQuARE that had astronauts on the ISS document six sample locations around the space station with daily photography for a two-month period. ISSAP has received national recognition in the form of the Archaeological Institute’s 2023 Award for Outstanding Work in Digital Archaeology and the American Anthropological Association’s 2023 General Anthropology Division New Directions Award. The project has been covered by global media including CNN, NPR, CBC Radio, PBS NOVA, Scientific American, Popular Science, The New York Times, WIRED, Ars Technica, Inverse, Archaeology magazine, Discover magazine, Smithsonian magazine, Cosmos magazine (Australia), R+D Magazine, PM History magazine (Germany), Space.com, CollectSpace, Forbes.com, and Agencia SINC (Spain).

Congratulations to Dr. Walsh and the rest of the ISSAP team!