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Here's the paper in Nature Communications: http://www.nature.com/ncomms/2015/150120/ncomms6895/full/ncomms6895.html http://www.nature.com/ncomms/2015/150120/nc

by troymc 12y ago

Here's the paper in Nature Communications: http://www.nature.com/ncomms/2015/150120/ncomms6895/full/ncomms6895.html http://www.nature.com/ncomms/2015/150120/ncomms6895/full/nco... "Revealing letters in rolled Herculaneum papyri by X-ray phase-contrast imaging" It's bizarre that BBC calls X-rays "photon beams," like something out of Star Trek. Maybe using X-rays to read rolled-up scrolls doesn't sound so amazing? (The details of how they did it are amazing; this is not your grandpa's X-ray imaging system.)

deleted 12y ago
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Tarang 12y ago
To be fair, X-Rays are photons, maybe its about the fine-grainness of the technique since they're not X-Raying it but looking for other minuscule changes
big_al337 12y ago
I think they were just trying the emphasize the giant scale of the operation. I feel like the average reader would associate x-rays with the machines found at hospitals. The synchrotron, of course, is a vastly different machine.
gone35 12y ago
Well; as you point out, X-ray phase-contrast tomography and conventional X-ray photography are (nearly) totally different things, so their phrasing seems justifiable to me, if only on editorial grounds --think "the full name of the technique is too long, would cause viewers to get mixed up with conventional X-ray imaging, etc.". Quibbles aside though, it's hard to overstate how significant this finding is: not only this is (apparently) the only extant library left from classical antiquity, but also these are freaking charred scrolls from a volcanic eruption that were considered beyond repair! I found ScienceDaily's article much more informative in this regard: http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2015/01/150122114405.htm http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2015/01/150122114405.ht...
- toyg 12y ago
  > it's hard to overstate how significant this finding is Let's not get too excited here, it's not like they've magically retrieved all texts; they've retrieved small fragments from a handful of scrolls and the process involved some luck and guesswork, not just software. For the technique itself to work, the scroll has to be slightly bumpy, and not all of them are like that. It's a great step forward, but still, it will likely take decades to retrieve significant portions of text from a small number of scrolls -- and this assuming efforts will always be fully funded (Italy has a lot of old stuff to look after, and they're not exactly swimming in cash right now -- they're even thinking of re-burying several large archeological sites because they simply cannot protect them at this time).

by troymc 12y ago

deleted 12y ago

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Tarang 12y ago

To be fair, X-Rays are photons, maybe its about the fine-grainness of the technique since they're not X-Raying it but looking for other minuscule changes

big_al337 12y ago

I think they were just trying the emphasize the giant scale of the operation. I feel like the average reader would associate x-rays with the machines found at hospitals. The synchrotron, of course, is a vastly different machine.

gone35 12y ago

Well; as you point out, X-ray phase-contrast tomography and conventional X-ray photography are (nearly) totally different things, so their phrasing seems justifiable to me, if only on editorial grounds --think "the full name of the technique is too long, would cause viewers to get mixed up with conventional X-ray imaging, etc.". Quibbles aside though, it's hard to overstate how significant this finding is: not only this is (apparently) the only extant library left from classical antiquity, but also these are freaking charred scrolls from a volcanic eruption that were considered beyond repair! I found ScienceDaily's article much more informative in this regard: http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2015/01/150122114405.htm http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2015/01/150122114405.ht...

toyg 12y ago
> it's hard to overstate how significant this finding is Let's not get too excited here, it's not like they've magically retrieved all texts; they've retrieved small fragments from a handful of scrolls and the process involved some luck and guesswork, not just software. For the technique itself to work, the scroll has to be slightly bumpy, and not all of them are like that. It's a great step forward, but still, it will likely take decades to retrieve significant portions of text from a small number of scrolls -- and this assuming efforts will always be fully funded (Italy has a lot of old stuff to look after, and they're not exactly swimming in cash right now -- they're even thinking of re-burying several large archeological sites because they simply cannot protect them at this time).