7 ms·

Egyptian pyramids found by infra-red satellite images

249 points by larryfreeman 15y ago

Wickk 15y ago
>"These are just the sites [close to] the surface. There are many thousands of additional sites that the Nile has covered over with silt. This is just the beginning of this kind of work." I am very curious as to what else they find through these excavations
- rakkhi 15y ago
  Exciting news indeed. Another Tutankhamen type excavation fully intact would be very cool
unwantedLetters 15y ago
I wonder how they get permission to scour Egypt with a satellite camera. And even if permission was given, will Egyptian authorities allow control of the satellite and the images captured to remain with a university outside the country? Anyone have a better idea how this process works?
- nivertech 15y ago
  Today you can order high-resolution satellite images online. Some countries will limit the resolution available by non-technical means.
  - new_world_order 15y ago
    Well, if you order images from a US company, you get limited resolution over US military bases and Israel. But say a Russian company will give you full resolution everywhere.
- mseebach 15y ago
  I don't think you need permission to take pictures of a country from space.
  - unwantedLetters 15y ago
    This is one of those times where I wish I could see how many points your comment got. I don't know whether you've gotten a lot of votes or not so I don't know if your answer makes sense to other people as well. Why do you think you don't need permission to take pictures of a country from space? I think there are certain areas in all countries that they would want to keep secret, and if you allow people to photograph in certain areas and not in others, that's exposing where these areas are (which is an invitation for governments to spy on those areas).
    - ak217 15y ago
      Although international law doesn't spell it out verbatim, the generally accepted principle is that sovereignty does not extend to the altitude where satellites fly. As such, it's impossible to prevent anyone from taking pictures of any country from space.
    - mseebach 15y ago
      Why does it matter how many points my comment got? But, the closest I could get: UN General Assembly, resolution 41/65, of 3 December 1986: Principles Relating to Remote Sensing of the Earth from Outer Space. Principle IV: These activities shall be conducted on the basis of respect for the principle of full and permanent sovereignty of all States and peoples over their own wealth and natural resources, with due regard to the rights and interests, in accordance with international law, of other States and entities under their jurisdiction. Such activities shall not be conducted in a manner detrimental to the legitimate rights and interests of the sensed State. I'm not sure how remote sensing could violate jurisdiction over wealth and resources, but it does not mention territory. And then there's principle XII: As soon as the primary data and the processed data concerning the territory under its jurisdiction are produced, the sensed State shall have access to them on a non-discriminatory basis and on reasonable cost terms. The sensed State shall also have access to the available analysed information concerning the territory under its jurisdiction in the possession of any State participating in remote sensing activities on the same basis and terms, taking particularly into account the needs and interests of the developing countries. If prior permission to perform the sensing was required, provisions stipulating that the data should be shared would be redundant, I think? Source: http://www.oosa.unvienna.org/oosa/en/SpaceLaw/gares/html/gares_41_0065.html http://www.oosa.unvienna.org/oosa/en/SpaceLaw/gares/html/gar...
swombat 15y ago
No word on whether Goa'uld holding chambers have been found in the new pyramids, I guess. History repeats itself. I wonder what we can find in our past that will inform our future. (although, one might say, the main thing that one learns from the study of history is that people do not learn from history)
- briggsbio 15y ago
  Nice.
kahawe 15y ago
How does this work exactly? The wikipedia page on Infrared did not turn up any such use... or I missed it. How can you see a mud brick under sand because it is "much denser than the soil that surrounds it"?
- JonnieCache 15y ago
  Denser == absorbs more of the light/different regions of the spectrum. This is detectable in the light that is reflected back. It's not dissimilar to how an ultrasound scanner is used to look at a baby in the womb. In fact, ultrasound is used in archaeology as well to do this sort of stuff, obviously on a smaller scale. This is the wikipedia page you want: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Infrared_spectroscopy http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Infrared_spectroscopy Although that page discusses things at very different scales to what we're talking about here, (while I am not a physicist,) the principles are basically the same.
  - hugh3 15y ago
    I am a physicist, and I'm afraid that the page on infra-red spectroscopy isn't really relevant due to (as you say) the very different length scales. What I think is really going on is thermodynamics. Suppose I bury a big stone pyramid under the sand. Stone is (I assume) a much better conductor of heat than sand. When the sun comes up after a cold night, it heats the sand, but the sand on top of the pyramid has its heat conducted away more efficiently than the sand far from the pyramid, so it'll show up as slightly cooler when imaged with the infra-red satellite.
    - pbhjpbhj 15y ago
      Do they look at day-night differential images? That would a priori seem to confirm your hypothesis and also provide a better imaging result. No I didn't read the article.
      - hugh3 15y ago
        That would a priori seem to confirm your hypothesis I'm not sure that a priori means what you think it means.
bproper 15y ago
This is awesome.
ra 15y ago
It's fascinating how many relics of ancient civilisation are concentrated in that part of the world. Many presenting puzzles yet to be solved.
- hugh3 15y ago
  It's fascinating how many relics of ancient civilisation are concentrated in that part of the world Not really. It'd be much more fascinating if you found relics of ancient civilisation which weren't concentrated in that part of the world.
  - kbutler 15y ago
    > It'd be much more fascinating if you found relics of ancient civilisation which weren't concentrated in that part of the world. The earliest egyptian pyramids were ~2600BC, corresponding with the rise of civilizations in China (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yellow_Emperor http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yellow_Emperor) and Peru (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Caral http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Caral). We've found a lot more iconic relics of Egyptian civilization from that time period, however.
- shii 15y ago
  On that line, by far the most intriguing and fascinating structure or relic from ancient human history is the site at Göbekli Tepe[1], in modern day Turkey. Shakes up pretty much every theory and timeline we have constructed on how humans probably developed over time and is much too early to fit in anywhere. [1]: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/G%C3%B6bekli_Tepe http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/G%C3%B6bekli_Tepe
  - ra 15y ago
    Wow! That's truly mind boggling. Thanks for the great link!
  - meatpeople 15y ago
    Gobekli Tepe is indeed fascinating. There's a good article on it in the latest National Geographic: http://ngm.nationalgeographic.com/2011/06/gobekli-tepe/mann-text http://ngm.nationalgeographic.com/2011/06/gobekli-tepe/mann-...
xbryanx 15y ago
My searching on this topic turned up this interesting book - http://www.amazon.com/Remote-Sensing-Archaeology-Interdisciplinary-Contributions/dp/038744615X/ref=pd_bxgy_b_img_b http://www.amazon.com/Remote-Sensing-Archaeology-Interdiscip... Seems like these techniques are going to radically change how we find new archaeological sites. Tech. project idea: Build some tools to help archaeologists learn and share from each other with this data. Build a world wide database of IR imagery just a few meters below the surface?
- phlux 15y ago
  Build a small sensor array with OTS parts arduino etc and attach to balloon that the Arch can use in the field to look around his position in real time with such techniques. And mount to DIYDrones for added awesome.
- mturmon 15y ago
  Yes, the idea in the OP is not new. To my knowledge, the first people to use remote sensing data in an archeological context used radar (SRTM, a synthetic aperture radar mapping mission that flew on the space shuttle). Radar can penetrate the land to a depth of ~meters depending on lots of factors. They discovered the lost city of Ubar, which was a trading city (ca. 3000 BC) in the Arabian peninsula that had been lost to the desert. They discovered it because trails that had formerly led into Ubar gave off stronger radar reflections. Later on-site digs confirmed actual ruins. This was in 1992. A link: http://photojournal.jpl.nasa.gov/catalog/PIA01721 http://photojournal.jpl.nasa.gov/catalog/PIA01721 The person who blurbed the book you found, Charles Elachi, was a key member of the team that designed the radar instrument that found Ubar. All of the SRTM data is online somewhere. The desert turns out to be a really good place to look for stuff. Less clutter.
xbryanx 15y ago
A colleague of mine worked with Sarah Parcak (the researcher featured) and says: "They use standard satellite images taken by NASA and then apply various photoshop filters to those images to find subtle differences in the terrain. Egypt works great because the starting palette is so clean. They've tried the same technology in South America and haven't had as much success." Not sure if this is the exact technique they are using in this article, but it's what we featured in an exhibit on Egypt he worked on.
Jun8 15y ago
Is it me or does news like this throw anyone else into a frenzy of daydreaming for a short while: using my computer expertise to enhance infrared images to reveal hitherto unknown pyramids (combining images from multiple spectral bands, SIFT object detection), battling with corrupt local authorities and looters, digging for the pyramid (and unfortunately losing a few of the team when the tunnel gives in), deciphering the Old Egyptian hieroglyphs on the door (with some help from my hardy MBP and my custom linguistic text analysis tools, written in a mixture of C++, Perl, and Scheme), going in and getting stumped by an empty chamber, but wait, there's a small tunnel leading away, investigating it with a remote controlled Arduiono-based robot I control with my Android tablet (e.g. http://www.gizapyramid.com/hidden.htm http://www.gizapyramid.com/hidden.htm) and awakening a long-sleeping evil force within. Then, the final battle to save Earth. OK, back to a rainy day in Chicago and trying to understand Puppet.
- phlux 15y ago
  INDY! NOOOOO
- saurabh 15y ago
  Yes. It's a curse.
- awj 15y ago
  FWIW, the puppet book [1] was pretty good. Didn't end up using it for the project, but it seemed readable/informative. [1] http://www.amazon.com/Pulling-Strings-Puppet-Automated-Administration/dp/1590599780 http://www.amazon.com/Pulling-Strings-Puppet-Automated-Admin...
  - Jun8 15y ago
    Thanks a lot for the link. I've started to read Pro Puppet by the same guy.
- NickPollard 15y ago
  Obligatory xkcd: http://xkcd.com/208/ http://xkcd.com/208/ It seems we've reached the point where there's an xkcd for every situation (on HN at least) now. Maybe a corollary to rule 34[1] is needed. [1] http://xkcd.com/305/ http://xkcd.com/305/
brianbreslin 15y ago
Does anyone know if satellite imagery could be used to map ocean floors for this type of use? Or would the water disrupt the infrared wavelength?
- dmboyd 15y ago
  check the absorption spectrum : http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Water_absorption_spectrum.png http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Water_absorption_spectrum.... Which also explains why the ocean is blue.
ars 15y ago
Where does the soil to cover the pyramids come from? Those are not small structures, and you aren't just covering them - you are covering a huge area of land. That soil has to come from somewhere, anyone know where?
- xbryanx 15y ago
  Most of the soils in this area are Nile delta deposits.
Groxx 15y ago
>... by looking at infra-red images which show up underground buildings. Yeah, I have to: those poor underground buildings... they just don't hold a candle to infra-red images from space, do they? Come on BBC, "show up"? We need a Ballmer-like "Editors! Editors! Editors!" chant right about now.
strebel 15y ago
Maybe we can find Atlantis now.

249 points by larryfreeman 15y ago

Wickk 15y ago

>"These are just the sites [close to] the surface. There are many thousands of additional sites that the Nile has covered over with silt. This is just the beginning of this kind of work." I am very curious as to what else they find through these excavations

rakkhi 15y ago
Exciting news indeed. Another Tutankhamen type excavation fully intact would be very cool

unwantedLetters 15y ago

I wonder how they get permission to scour Egypt with a satellite camera. And even if permission was given, will Egyptian authorities allow control of the satellite and the images captured to remain with a university outside the country? Anyone have a better idea how this process works?

nivertech 15y ago
Today you can order high-resolution satellite images online. Some countries will limit the resolution available by non-technical means.
- new_world_order 15y ago
  Well, if you order images from a US company, you get limited resolution over US military bases and Israel. But say a Russian company will give you full resolution everywhere.
mseebach 15y ago
I don't think you need permission to take pictures of a country from space.
- unwantedLetters 15y ago
  This is one of those times where I wish I could see how many points your comment got. I don't know whether you've gotten a lot of votes or not so I don't know if your answer makes sense to other people as well. Why do you think you don't need permission to take pictures of a country from space? I think there are certain areas in all countries that they would want to keep secret, and if you allow people to photograph in certain areas and not in others, that's exposing where these areas are (which is an invitation for governments to spy on those areas).
  - ak217 15y ago
    Although international law doesn't spell it out verbatim, the generally accepted principle is that sovereignty does not extend to the altitude where satellites fly. As such, it's impossible to prevent anyone from taking pictures of any country from space.
  - mseebach 15y ago
    Why does it matter how many points my comment got? But, the closest I could get: UN General Assembly, resolution 41/65, of 3 December 1986: Principles Relating to Remote Sensing of the Earth from Outer Space. Principle IV: These activities shall be conducted on the basis of respect for the principle of full and permanent sovereignty of all States and peoples over their own wealth and natural resources, with due regard to the rights and interests, in accordance with international law, of other States and entities under their jurisdiction. Such activities shall not be conducted in a manner detrimental to the legitimate rights and interests of the sensed State. I'm not sure how remote sensing could violate jurisdiction over wealth and resources, but it does not mention territory. And then there's principle XII: As soon as the primary data and the processed data concerning the territory under its jurisdiction are produced, the sensed State shall have access to them on a non-discriminatory basis and on reasonable cost terms. The sensed State shall also have access to the available analysed information concerning the territory under its jurisdiction in the possession of any State participating in remote sensing activities on the same basis and terms, taking particularly into account the needs and interests of the developing countries. If prior permission to perform the sensing was required, provisions stipulating that the data should be shared would be redundant, I think? Source: http://www.oosa.unvienna.org/oosa/en/SpaceLaw/gares/html/gares_41_0065.html http://www.oosa.unvienna.org/oosa/en/SpaceLaw/gares/html/gar...

swombat 15y ago

No word on whether Goa'uld holding chambers have been found in the new pyramids, I guess. History repeats itself. I wonder what we can find in our past that will inform our future. (although, one might say, the main thing that one learns from the study of history is that people do not learn from history)

briggsbio 15y ago
Nice.

kahawe 15y ago

How does this work exactly? The wikipedia page on Infrared did not turn up any such use... or I missed it. How can you see a mud brick under sand because it is "much denser than the soil that surrounds it"?

JonnieCache 15y ago
Denser == absorbs more of the light/different regions of the spectrum. This is detectable in the light that is reflected back. It's not dissimilar to how an ultrasound scanner is used to look at a baby in the womb. In fact, ultrasound is used in archaeology as well to do this sort of stuff, obviously on a smaller scale. This is the wikipedia page you want: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Infrared_spectroscopy http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Infrared_spectroscopy Although that page discusses things at very different scales to what we're talking about here, (while I am not a physicist,) the principles are basically the same.
- hugh3 15y ago
  I am a physicist, and I'm afraid that the page on infra-red spectroscopy isn't really relevant due to (as you say) the very different length scales. What I think is really going on is thermodynamics. Suppose I bury a big stone pyramid under the sand. Stone is (I assume) a much better conductor of heat than sand. When the sun comes up after a cold night, it heats the sand, but the sand on top of the pyramid has its heat conducted away more efficiently than the sand far from the pyramid, so it'll show up as slightly cooler when imaged with the infra-red satellite.
  - pbhjpbhj 15y ago
    Do they look at day-night differential images? That would a priori seem to confirm your hypothesis and also provide a better imaging result. No I didn't read the article.
    - hugh3 15y ago
      That would a priori seem to confirm your hypothesis I'm not sure that a priori means what you think it means.

bproper 15y ago

This is awesome.

ra 15y ago

It's fascinating how many relics of ancient civilisation are concentrated in that part of the world. Many presenting puzzles yet to be solved.

hugh3 15y ago
It's fascinating how many relics of ancient civilisation are concentrated in that part of the world Not really. It'd be much more fascinating if you found relics of ancient civilisation which weren't concentrated in that part of the world.
- kbutler 15y ago
  > It'd be much more fascinating if you found relics of ancient civilisation which weren't concentrated in that part of the world. The earliest egyptian pyramids were ~2600BC, corresponding with the rise of civilizations in China (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yellow_Emperor http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yellow_Emperor) and Peru (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Caral http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Caral). We've found a lot more iconic relics of Egyptian civilization from that time period, however.
shii 15y ago
On that line, by far the most intriguing and fascinating structure or relic from ancient human history is the site at Göbekli Tepe[1], in modern day Turkey. Shakes up pretty much every theory and timeline we have constructed on how humans probably developed over time and is much too early to fit in anywhere. [1]: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/G%C3%B6bekli_Tepe http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/G%C3%B6bekli_Tepe
- ra 15y ago
  Wow! That's truly mind boggling. Thanks for the great link!
- meatpeople 15y ago
  Gobekli Tepe is indeed fascinating. There's a good article on it in the latest National Geographic: http://ngm.nationalgeographic.com/2011/06/gobekli-tepe/mann-text http://ngm.nationalgeographic.com/2011/06/gobekli-tepe/mann-...

xbryanx 15y ago

My searching on this topic turned up this interesting book - http://www.amazon.com/Remote-Sensing-Archaeology-Interdisciplinary-Contributions/dp/038744615X/ref=pd_bxgy_b_img_b http://www.amazon.com/Remote-Sensing-Archaeology-Interdiscip... Seems like these techniques are going to radically change how we find new archaeological sites. Tech. project idea: Build some tools to help archaeologists learn and share from each other with this data. Build a world wide database of IR imagery just a few meters below the surface?

phlux 15y ago
Build a small sensor array with OTS parts arduino etc and attach to balloon that the Arch can use in the field to look around his position in real time with such techniques. And mount to DIYDrones for added awesome.
mturmon 15y ago
Yes, the idea in the OP is not new. To my knowledge, the first people to use remote sensing data in an archeological context used radar (SRTM, a synthetic aperture radar mapping mission that flew on the space shuttle). Radar can penetrate the land to a depth of ~meters depending on lots of factors. They discovered the lost city of Ubar, which was a trading city (ca. 3000 BC) in the Arabian peninsula that had been lost to the desert. They discovered it because trails that had formerly led into Ubar gave off stronger radar reflections. Later on-site digs confirmed actual ruins. This was in 1992. A link: http://photojournal.jpl.nasa.gov/catalog/PIA01721 http://photojournal.jpl.nasa.gov/catalog/PIA01721 The person who blurbed the book you found, Charles Elachi, was a key member of the team that designed the radar instrument that found Ubar. All of the SRTM data is online somewhere. The desert turns out to be a really good place to look for stuff. Less clutter.

xbryanx 15y ago

A colleague of mine worked with Sarah Parcak (the researcher featured) and says: "They use standard satellite images taken by NASA and then apply various photoshop filters to those images to find subtle differences in the terrain. Egypt works great because the starting palette is so clean. They've tried the same technology in South America and haven't had as much success." Not sure if this is the exact technique they are using in this article, but it's what we featured in an exhibit on Egypt he worked on.

Jun8 15y ago

Is it me or does news like this throw anyone else into a frenzy of daydreaming for a short while: using my computer expertise to enhance infrared images to reveal hitherto unknown pyramids (combining images from multiple spectral bands, SIFT object detection), battling with corrupt local authorities and looters, digging for the pyramid (and unfortunately losing a few of the team when the tunnel gives in), deciphering the Old Egyptian hieroglyphs on the door (with some help from my hardy MBP and my custom linguistic text analysis tools, written in a mixture of C++, Perl, and Scheme), going in and getting stumped by an empty chamber, but wait, there's a small tunnel leading away, investigating it with a remote controlled Arduiono-based robot I control with my Android tablet (e.g. http://www.gizapyramid.com/hidden.htm http://www.gizapyramid.com/hidden.htm) and awakening a long-sleeping evil force within. Then, the final battle to save Earth. OK, back to a rainy day in Chicago and trying to understand Puppet.

phlux 15y ago
INDY! NOOOOO
saurabh 15y ago
Yes. It's a curse.
awj 15y ago
FWIW, the puppet book [1] was pretty good. Didn't end up using it for the project, but it seemed readable/informative. [1] http://www.amazon.com/Pulling-Strings-Puppet-Automated-Administration/dp/1590599780 http://www.amazon.com/Pulling-Strings-Puppet-Automated-Admin...
- Jun8 15y ago
  Thanks a lot for the link. I've started to read Pro Puppet by the same guy.
NickPollard 15y ago
Obligatory xkcd: http://xkcd.com/208/ http://xkcd.com/208/ It seems we've reached the point where there's an xkcd for every situation (on HN at least) now. Maybe a corollary to rule 34[1] is needed. [1] http://xkcd.com/305/ http://xkcd.com/305/

brianbreslin 15y ago

Does anyone know if satellite imagery could be used to map ocean floors for this type of use? Or would the water disrupt the infrared wavelength?

dmboyd 15y ago
check the absorption spectrum : http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Water_absorption_spectrum.png http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Water_absorption_spectrum.... Which also explains why the ocean is blue.

ars 15y ago

Where does the soil to cover the pyramids come from? Those are not small structures, and you aren't just covering them - you are covering a huge area of land. That soil has to come from somewhere, anyone know where?

xbryanx 15y ago
Most of the soils in this area are Nile delta deposits.

Groxx 15y ago

>... by looking at infra-red images which show up underground buildings. Yeah, I have to: those poor underground buildings... they just don't hold a candle to infra-red images from space, do they? Come on BBC, "show up"? We need a Ballmer-like "Editors! Editors! Editors!" chant right about now.

strebel 15y ago

Maybe we can find Atlantis now.