The School of Information and Library (SILS) Metadata Research Center has been established to advance research in the area of metadata, semantics and ontologies. Digital resource repositories representing nearly every domain (e.g., scientific, educational, commerce, medical, cultural information domains) are growing rapidly, particularly as people, organizations, and enterprises, increasingly turn to the Web for recording, preserving, and disseminating information. Commercial search engines using statistical algorithms facilitate resource discovery on the Web, often providing satisfactory results.

As digital repositories and the global Web continue to grow, retrieval effectiveness and search engine scalability can decline. Metadata is an important means for enhancing resource discovery, and is a fundamental component of the Semantic Web (see also: ASIS&T bulletin special issue on the Semantic Web).

This predicament invites a host of research questions requiring rigorous investigation: Who should create metadata? What metadata-generation techniques (e.g., automatic and/or manual) are the most efficient and effective? What features should be included in metadata generation applications? The has been established to lead and facilitate research efforts addressing these and other metadata questions, including research focusing on semantics and ontologies.

Metadata Research Center
School of Information and Library Science
University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
216 Lenoir Drive
CB#3360, 100 Manning Hall
Chapel Hill, NC 27599-3360

Email: metadataresearch@yahoo.com