Peter Burnhill
Peter Burnhill is Director of EDINA, www.edina.ac.uk, the JISC UK National Data Centre based at the University of Edinburgh. Once a researcher and statistician with the Scottish Education Data Archive, in 1984 he began a career providing data services, first establishing the University’s Data Library, becoming co-director of the ESRC Regional Research Laboratory for Scotland to promote the value of geographical information systems. Designation of the Data Library as the EDINA national data centre in 1995 has given Peter the opportunity to work beyond numbers, with words and now pictures and sounds: all become digital and accessed from afar. His interests as director and ‘information methodologist’ range wide. Peter is a Past President of IASSIST, the International Association for Social Science Information Service and Technology, the association for data library professionals – see www.iassistdata.org . He was also the initial director of the Digital Curation Centre during its set-up phase in 2004/5. He has served on a variety of working groups in the data and serials world, inside and outside the academy walls.