Web Science and Digital Libraries Research Group

In collaboration with Dr. Alexander Nwala at William & Mary and Dr. Sawood Alam at the Internet Archive , we ( Himarsha R. Jayanetti , Dr. Michael L. Nelson , and Dr. Michele C. Weigle ) at the Web Science and Digital Libraries (WS-DL) Research Group at Old Dominion University received an award of $750,000 in federal funds from the Institute of Museum and Library Services (IMLS) beginning in August 2026. The award supports the project, “CiteCast: Linking US local & national television news to cited web resources” .  The project focuses on identifying and preserving web resources referenced in archived U.S. local and national television news. Television news frequently points viewers to websites, social media posts, and other online resources, but those resources can change or disappear over time. The goal of this is to help connect these references in television archives with the corresponding web resources and preserve them for future research. Figure 1: Example TV ...

Hello! My name is  Pasindu Sankalpa , and I am an international student from Sri Lanka. In Fall 2025, I joined the  NIRDS Lab  (Neuro-Information Retrieval and Data Science Lab) in  WS-DL  (Web Science and Digital Libraries Research Group) at  Old Dominion University  as a PhD student under the supervision of  Dr. Sampath Jayarathna . In December 2024, I graduated with a B.Sc. Engineering (Hons) degree in Electronic and Telecommunication Engineering from the  University of Moratuwa , earning First-Class Honors. During my undergraduate studies, my final-year research project focused on “ Deep Learning–based Drone Classification by Utilizing Radar Cross Section Signatures ”, supervised by  Dr. Sampath Perera . This work addressed the limitations of traditional drone detection techniques by proposing a multi-modal deep learning approach for real-time detection and classification.  This paper has been submitted for publication. Alongsid...

It felt like yesterday when I first enrolled in Old Dominion University (ODU) to pursue a Ph.D. in Computer Science in 2019 ( Muntabir's introduction ). Fortunately, I was accepted to the Lab for Applied Machine Learning and Natural Language Processing Systems  (LAMP-SYS), part of the Web Science and Digital Libraries Research Group  (WSDL) in the Department of Computer Science at ODU. LAMP-SYS is led by Dr. Jian Wu  and focuses on building intelligent systems that solve real-world problems using natural language processing (NLP), computer vision (CV), machine learning (ML), and deep learning (DL) techniques. I was overwhelmed with joy on the day when I had my first meeting with my professor regarding project briefs and discussions. I was assigned to a collaborated project with Virginia Tech called " Mining Electronic Theses and Dissertations (ETDs) ," supported by the Institute of Museum and Library Services (IMLS) . ETDs are scholarly articles that usually serve as...

In the Spring of 2019, I embarked on a six-year journey toward earning my PhD in Computer Science. After completing my undergraduate degree in Computer Science and Engineering at the University of Moratuwa , Sri Lanka, in 2018, I applied to the Computer Science PhD program at Old Dominion University (ODU). I was fortunate to be accepted to the Neuro Information Retrieval and Data Science (NIRDS) Lab , which is part of ODU’s Web Science and Digital Libraries (WSDL) Research Group . Led by Dr. Sampath Jayarathna , the NIRDS lab focuses on applied research involving human subjects and multimodal biosignals. Early in my PhD, before defining my research focus, I explored how to operate our lab's various biosignal acquisition devices and software (Eye Trackers, EEG Devices, and Wearable Health Sensors). This exploration allowed me to gain a deep understanding of the tools and technologies around human-subjects research, as well as their capabilities and limitations. A recurring issue th...

I ( Gavindya Jayawardena ) began my PhD journey in Spring 2019 under the guidance of Dr. Sampath Jayarathna at Old Dominion University (ODU) , immediately after completing my Bachelor’s degree. I joined the Neuro-Information Retrieval and Data Science (NIRDS) lab , a subgroup within the Web Science and Digital Libraries (WSDL) research lab in the Computer Science Department . Dr. Sampath Jayarathna provided me with the opportunity to engage in eye-tracking research, which rapidly became the central focus of my studies. In collaboration with Dr. Anne Perrotti from ODU, I explored how eye-tracking measurements could be utilized to predict Attention-Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD) using machine learning algorithms. By extracting raw eye-tracking data, I created a feature set that enabled multiple models to achieve high prediction accuracy with tree-based classifiers. Additionally, I studied the performance of adolescents with ADHD during an audiovisual Speech-In-Noise t...