Category Archives: WORLD

AFRICA, WORLD

Researchers discovered a 2 billion-year-old ancient nuclear reactor in Africa

Researchers discovered a 2 billion year old ancient nuclear reactor in Africa

The Oklo-reactor in Gabon, Africa is one of the most intriguing geological formations found on planet Earth. Here, naturally occurring fissile materials in two billion-year-old rocks have sustained a slow nuclear fission reaction like that found in a modern nuclear reactor.

Uranium-235 is a radioactive element with a half-life of 700 million years.

Traces of it are found in almost all rocks, especially magmatic rocks, and its decay is believed to be one of the sources of Earth’s inner heat. Because it decays over time at a constant rate, its concentration in the Earth’s crust is almost everywhere the same – except in Oklo.

The Oklo-Formation, a succession of sandstone and siltstone, was deposited two billion years ago by a large river. Microbial activity of the first lifeforms caused the element uranium, derived from weathered magmatic rocks, to become concentrated in certain layers of the sediments.

Later tectonic movements buried the layers deep underground.

Simplified geology of the Oklo-Okèlobondo natural nuclear reactors.

In 1972, chemical analysis showed an unusually low concentration of uranium-235 in the ore mined in the Oklo open pit mine. However, there were high concentrations of elements like caesium, curium, americium and even plutonium to be found. Such elements are formed today only in nuclear reactors, as the uranium decays during controlled nuclear fission.

When uranium-235 decays, it will emit three neutrons. If one of the emitted neutrons hits another uranium atom, this atom will also decay and a chain reaction will begin. In most rocks, there is either not enough uranium to sustain nuclear fission or it decays too fast to cause a chain reaction.

In the Oklo-reactor, two factors came together to sustain slow nuclear fission for hundreds of thousands of years. Weathering of magmatic rocks and bacterial activity concentrated the uranium enough to start a nuclear chain reaction. Then the water that infiltrated the formation along faults slowed down the emitted neutrons enough to sustain slow and stable nuclear fission. As the uranium decays, it forms other radioactive elements fueling the reactor.

Over time the Oklo-reactor has produced large quantities of toxic plutonium and caesium-isotopes, which have since decayed into stable and harmless barium. During this process, however, no harmful radioactivity has leaked into the environment.

As the planet warms due to our carbon emissions, burning oil and coal is no longer a sustainable way to meet humanity’s hunger for energy.

Many experts believe that nuclear energy could be a temporary solution until renewable energy sources are ready to meet the demand. Unfortunately, nuclear energy comes with radioactive waste.

A permanent repository for nuclear waste must contain toxic elements and radioactivity for at least 100,000 years. The problem is that we don’t know what materials to use for the containers to store the waste.

Steel will rust, concrete can leak and even glass is damaged by the emitted radiation. By studying the Oklo-reactor, scientists hope to find a way to safely dispose of nuclear waste as produced by modern reactors.

Research by a team of scientists of the US Naval Research Laboratory in Washington D. C. and published in the journal PNAS has investigated how the Oklo-reactor was able to work so long and yet not pollute the environment. In rocks recovered from the Oklo mine, barium (the ‘trace’ left by the former radioactive elements) is not found evenly distributed but rather found in nests surrounded by a thin layer of ruthenium compounds.

Native ruthenium is a rare and inert metal often associated with ore of other elements. The scientists believe that the radioactive plutonium and caesium were encapsulated and safely isolated from the environment by a shell of ruthenium-compounds. If so, containers made of ruthenium alloys could be used to safely store radioactive waste for a very long time.

As the Oklo-reactor demonstrates, the ruthenium compounds remain stable even if exposed to radioactivity and corrosion by water over vast geological periods.

AFRICA, EGYPT, WORLD

Cosmic-Ray Muons Reveal Hidden Void in the Great Pyramid

Cosmic-Ray Muons Reveal Hidden Void in the Great Pyramid

Cosmic rays have revealed a hidden void inside the Great Pyramid of Giza in Egypt, scientists said Thursday. They don’t know what’s in it or what it was built for, but it does not look like a secret burial chamber.

Cosmic-Ray Muons Reveal Hidden Void in the Great Pyramid
3D artistic view made by the ScanPyramids mission shows a hidden internal structure in Khufu’s Pyramid, the largest pyramid in Giza.

It’s shaped more like a 30-yard-long gallery or corridor, the international team of researchers reported in the journal Nature.

“We open the question to Egyptologists, architects and archaeologists: what could it be?” Hany Helal of Cairo University told reporters on a telephone briefing.

3D artistic view made by the ScanPyramids mission shows a hidden internal structure in Khufus Pyramid, the largest pyramid in Giza.

“We don’t know for the moment if it’s horizontal or inclined if it is made from one structure or several successive structures,” Mehdi Tayoubi, president of France’s Heritage Innovation Presentation (HIP) Institute, added.

“What we do know is that this void is there, that it is impressive, that it was not expected by any kind of theory.”

Rumours have abounded for centuries about hidden rooms in the pyramids at Giza. But it’s hard to get through the tons of stone blocks used to make the 455-foot-high great pyramid of Khufu (or Cheops.) Radar can’t do it well.

“A lot of people tried to dig some tunnels looking for chambers,” Tayoubi said. Tourists get in through the “robbers’ tunnel,” dug out centuries ago.

Visitors looking for mummies or treasure have been disappointed. The 4,500-year-old tomb was robbed millennia ago.

Yet archaeologists have long believed there is more to the inside than the three chambers, corridors and air shafts that have been discovered.

The international ScanPyramids team used special film plates to catch, over a period of months, particles called muons that are created when high-energy cosmic rays hit the upper atmosphere.

They are few and far between — that’s why it took months — but they can pass through the stone and collect on the plates.

They produced a fuzzy image of some kind of open space above what’s known as the Grand Gallery of the pyramid.

“These results constitute a breakthrough for the understanding of Khufu’s Pyramid and its internal structure,” the researchers wrote. “While there is currently no information about the role of this void, these findings show how modern particle physics can shed new light on the world’s archaeological heritage.”

It’s the “first major inner structure found in the Great Pyramid since the 19th century,” the team added.

Muon imaging has also been used to peer inside Fukushima’s nuclear reactor, at archaeological sites near Rome and into the Teotihuacan Pyramid of the Sun in Mexico.

Now the question is how to get a better look at what’s in there, but that would require drilling.

Nonetheless, Jean-Baptiste Mouret of France’s national institute for computer science and applied mathematics is working to design a small drone that could explore the space if the team gets permission from the Egyptian government.

Last year, the same team used muon detection and infrared measurements to image some kind of corridor right above the entrance to the pyramid.

ASIA, CHINA, WORLD

Perfectly-preserved dinosaur embryo found inside the fossilized egg in China

Perfectly-preserved dinosaur embryo found inside the fossilized egg in China

A well-preserved dinosaur embryo has been found inside a fossilized egg. The fossilized dinosaur embryo came from Ganzhou, Jiangxi Province in southern China and was acquired by researchers in 2000.

Researchers at Yingliang Group, a company that mines stones, suspected it contained egg fossils, but put it in storage for 10 years, according to a news release.

When construction began on Yingliang Stone Natural History Museum, boxes of unearthed fossils were sorted through.

“Museum staff identified them as dinosaur eggs and saw some bones on the broken cross-section of one of the eggs,” Lida Xing of China University of Geosciences, Beijing, said in a news release. An embryo was found hidden within, which they named “Baby Yingliang.”

The embryo is that of the bird-like oviraptorosaurs, part of the theropod group. Theropod means “beast foot,” but theropod feet usually resembled those of birds. Birds are descended from one lineage of small theropods. 

Perfectly-preserved dinosaur embryo found inside the fossilized egg in China
Reconstruction of a close-to-hatching oviraptorosaur egg.

In studying the embryo, researchers found the dinosaur took on a distinctive tucking posture before hatching, which had been considered unique to birds.

The study is published in the science journal.

Researchers say this behaviour may have evolved through non-avian theropods.

“Most known non-avian dinosaur embryos are incomplete with skeletons disarticulated,” said Waisum Maof the University of Birmingham, U.K.

“We were surprised to see this embryo beautifully preserved inside a dinosaur egg, lying in a bird-like posture. This posture had not been recognized in non-avian dinosaurs before.”

The oviraptorosaur embryo, which has been named “Baby Yingliang.”

While fossilized dinosaur eggs have been found during the last 100 years, discovering a well-preserved embryo is very rare, the researchers said in the release. 

The embryo’s posture was not previously seen in non-avian dinosaurs, which is “especially notable because it’s reminiscent of a late-stage modern bird embryo.”

The researchers will continue to study the rare specimen in even more depth.

They will attempt to image its internal anatomy. Some of its body parts are still covered in rocks. Their findings can also be used in more studies of fossil embryos.

AFRICA, EGYPT, WORLD

The cache of 13,000 Ancient Clay Texts Found in Sohag

The cache of 13,000 Ancient Clay Texts Found in Sohag

A German-Egyptian mission at Al-Sheikh Hamad archaeological site in Tel Atribis in Sohag has unearthed a collection of 13,000 ostraca (clay vessel fragments) which bear engraved text in demotic, hieratic, Coptic, Greek and Arabic, the Egyptian Ministry of Antiquities and Tourism said on Wednesday.

The cache of 13,000 Ancient Clay Texts Found in Sohag

“This is a very important discovery because it sheds light on the economy and trade in Atribis throughout history.

The text reveals the financial transactions of the area’s inhabitants, who bought and sold provisions such as wheat and bread,” said Mostafa Waziri, secretary-general of the antiquities ministry’s Supreme Council of Antiquities.

Christian Latis, head of the German mission, explains that archaeologists are now studying the ostraca in order to learn more about the activities of the area’s past inhabitants.

Latis suggests that the text written on the ostraca indicates that the area may have housed a school for teaching demotic, hieratic, hieroglyphic and Greek writing.

Mohamed Abdel-Badia, head of the central department for Upper Egypt, revealed that the mission has also found a collection of ostraca that date back to the Roman or Byzantine eras.

Atribis was one of the ancient towns of the nine nomes of ancient Egypt. It is located on the west bank of the Nile southwest of Sohag city.

EUROPE, GREENLAND, WORLD

Why Did the Vikings Leave Greenland?

Why Did the Vikings Leave Greenland?

The Vikings are remembered as fierce fighters, but even these mighty warriors were no match for climate change. Scientists recently found that ice sheet growth and sea-level rise led to massive coastal flooding that inundated Norse farms and ultimately drove the Vikings out of Greenland in the 15th century.

The Vikings first established a foothold in southern Greenland around A.D. 985 with the arrival of Erik Thorvaldsson, also known as “Erik the Red,” a Norwegian-born explorer who sailed to Greenland after being exiled from Iceland.

Other Viking settlers soon followed, forming communities in Eystribyggð (Eastern Settlement) and Vestribyggð (Western Settlement) that thrived for centuries. (At the time of the Vikings’ arrival, Greenland was already inhabited by people of the Dorset Culture, an Indigenous group that preceded the arrival of the Inuit people in the Arctic, according to the University of California Riverside).

Around the 15th century, signs of Norse habitation in the region vanished from the archaeological record.

Researchers previously suggested that factors such as climate change and economic shifts likely led the Vikings to abandon Greenland.

Now, new findings show that rising seas played a key role, by submerging miles of coastline, according to data presented Wednesday (Dec. 15) at the annual conference of the American Geophysical Union (AGU), held this week in New Orleans and online.

Between the 14th and 19th centuries, Europe and North America experienced a period of significantly cooler temperatures, known as the Little Ice Age.

Ruins of a church in Hvalsey, a Norse settlement in Greenland. Vikings built the structure around the 14th century.

Under these chilly conditions, the Greenland Ice Sheet — a vast blanket of ice covering most of Greenland — would have become even bigger, Marisa Julia Borreggine, a doctoral candidate in the Department of Earth and Planetary Sciences at Harvard University, said in a presentation at the AGU conference. 

As the ice sheet advanced, its increasing heaviness weighed down the substrate underneath, making coastal areas more prone to flooding, Borreggine said.

At the same time, the increased gravitational attraction between the expanding ice sheet and large masses of sea ice pushed more seawater over Greenland’s coast.

These two processes could have driven widespread flooding along the coastline — “exactly where the Vikings were settled,” Borreggine said. 

The scientists tested their hypothesis by modeling estimated ice growth in southwestern Greenland over the 400-year period of Norse occupation and adding those calculations to a model showing sea-level rise during that time. Then, they analyzed maps of known Viking sites to see how their findings lined up with archaeological evidence marking the end of a Viking presence in Greenland. 

Their models showed that from about 1000 to 1400, rising seas around Greenland would have flooded Viking settlements by as much as 16 feet (5 meters), affecting about 54 square miles (140 square kilometers) of coastal land, Borreggine said.

This flooding would have submerged land that the Vikings used for farming and as grazing pastures for their cattle, according to the models.

However, sea-level rise was probably not the only reason the Vikings left Greenland.

Other types of challenges can cause even long-standing communities to collapse, and a perfect storm of external pressures — such as climate change, social unrest and resource depletion — may have spurred the Vikings to abandon their settlements for good, Borreggine said. 

“A combination of climate and environmental change, the shifting resource landscape, the flux of supply and demand of exclusive products for the foreign market, and interactions with Inuit in the North all could have contributed to this out-migration,” she said. “Likely a combination of these factors led to the Norse migration out of Greenland and further west.”

EUROPE, SCOTLAND, WORLD

Unique Medieval Vessel Restored in Scotland

Unique Medieval Vessel Restored in Scotland

When the Galloway hoard was unearthed from a ploughed field in western Scotland in 2014, it offered the richest collection of Viking-age objects ever found in Britain or Ireland. But one of the artefacts paled in comparison with treasures such as a gold bird-shaped pin and a silver-gilt vessel because it was within a pouch that was mangled and misshapen after almost 1,000 years in the ground.

Now that pouch has been removed and its contents restored, revealing an extraordinary Roman rock crystal jar wrapped in exquisite layers of gold thread by the finest medieval craftsman in the late eighth or early ninth century. About 5cm high, it may once have held a perfume or other prized potion used to anoint kings, or in religious ceremonies. It had been carefully wrapped in a silk-lined leather pouch, reflecting its significance.

The hoard, which included about 100 objects, was buried around AD900 and contained artefacts from the Anglo-Saxon kingdoms, Ireland and as far away as Asia. It was unearthed by a metal detectorist on what is now Church of Scotland land in Kirkcudbrightshire.

The rock crystal jar was part of the Galloway hoard, unearthed in Kirkcudbrightshire in 2014.

After a fundraising campaign to raise £2m, it was acquired by National Museums Scotland in 2017.

Dr Martin Goldberg, NMS’s principal curator of early medieval and Viking collections, described the jar as “really beautiful” and all the more exceptional because his research has led him to conclude that the rock crystal carving was in fact, Roman. It was perhaps 600 years old by the time it was transformed into a gold-wrapped jar.

He said: “So it’s a really surprising and unique object.”

Dr Leslie Webster, former keeper of Britain, prehistory and Europe at the British Museum, said: “Rock crystal is unusual in itself. It … was greatly prized in the antique world for its transparency and translucency, and so it’s associated with purity. So it was, I think even in its time, very, very special.

“I’ve seen a lot of Anglo-Saxon finds over the years in my professional career, some of them amazing. But this absolutely knocks them all into a cocked hat.”

The base of the rock crystal jar.

The restoration has revealed an unexpected Latin inscription on the jar’s base. Spelt out in gold letters, it translates as “Bishop Hyguald had me made”. This is crucial evidence that some of the hoard’s material may have come from a church in the Anglo-Saxon kingdom of Northumbria, which included Dumfries and Galloway and stretched as far north as Edinburgh and as far south as Sheffield.

At the start of the 10th century, Alfred the Great was pushing back the Danes, laying the foundations of medieval England and Alba, the kingdom that became medieval Scotland. It is unclear whether the hoard was buried by a Viking – Norse sagas refer to riches being buried to be accessed in the afterlife – or someone fearing Viking raids at a time when ecclesiastical treasures were being robbed from monasteries.

Goldberg said that silk was then a particularly luxurious and exotic material: “It’s come from Asia, so it’s travelled thousands of miles. It’s an example of how precious they thought this object inside was,” he said.

Although Bishop Hyguald may have been a prominent figure in Northumbrian ecclesiastical circles, church chronicles of the period are incomplete, partly because of the Viking invasions.

Goldberg expressed excitement at finding the name. “So much of the past is anonymous, especially when you’re looking at very early history,” he said. “There are very few names to work with. But this is adding new information, building a much richer picture.”

The rock crystal design resembles the capital of a Corinthian column, with carved lobes that look like foliage, he realised. “It’s almost a perfect model of a Corinthian column, but the scale is minute,” he said.

There is the possibility that this jar still bears trace elements of the potion it once held and that its precise chemicals can be revealed.

Goldberg said: “The type of liquid that we would expect would be something very exotic, perhaps a perfume from the Orient, something’s that’s travelled in the same way that the silk has. There were certain types of exotic oil that were used in anointing kings and ecclesiastical ceremonies.”

Ninety-seven of the hoard’s artefacts are included in a touring exhibition, titled The Galloway hoard: Viking-age treasure. It is at Kirkcudbright Galleries, near the site of its discovery, until 10 July, transferring to Aberdeen Art Gallery from 30 July to 23 October. The jar is undergoing final work but, from Monday, a new film and digital model will be featured.

ASIA, PAKISTAN, WORLD

The oldest Buddhist apsidal temple of the country found in Swat

Oldest Buddhist apsidal temple of country found in Swat

A team of Pakistani and Italian archaeologists have found a 2300-year-old Apsidal temple of the Buddhist period and a treasure in the Bazira city of Barikot tehsil, Swat district in Pakistan.

The location of these artefacts is in the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province. Know more about the discovery below. 

Take a look at the helicopter view of the site found

A senior official said, “The Pakistani and Italian archaeologists during joint excavations at a historic site have discovered over 2,300 years old Apsidal temple of the Buddhist period in north-west Pakistan besides recovering other precious artefacts.

Oldest Buddhist apsidal temple of country found in Swat

The temple discovered in Swat is even older than the Temples discovered in Taxila remains of Pakistan.”

Professor Luca said, “This is an astonishingly important discovery as it attests to a new architectural shape of Buddhist structure in Gandhara.

We only have one other example of the apsidal temple in a city at Sirkap, Taxila. However, the apsidal temple of Bazira is so far the earliest example of this architecture in Pakistan.” 

As per the archaeologists, the temple is almost 2300 years old and along with that 2700 other Buddhist period coins, rings, pots and other artefacts worth millions have been recovered. 

An interesting discovery is of something written in the Kharosthi language of the King of Greece, Menander

What is the Inference derived from the discovery?

The head of the Italian archaeological mission in Pakistan Dr Luca Maria Oliver informed that this discovery of the Temple of the Buddhist period is approving of the fact that Swat is home to the oldest archaeological remains than Taxila.

There are many more recoveries expected from this zone of Brazira city. Dr Abdus Samad, the director of museum and archaeology, said, “Bazira city in Barikot Swat is older than Taxila remains too.”

The discovery also proves that Swat had been a sacred place for six to seven religions.

Dr Samad has informed the media that there were 14 archaeological sites under section 4 where the excavation process was carried out.

The Italian ambassador to Pakistan Andreas Ferrarese informed the media, “The Italian archaeological mission in collaboration with Khyber Pakhtunkhwa archaeological department has been protecting and excavating archaeological sites for the last seventy years in Pakistan.”

The site was discovered by archaeologists of Ca’ Foscari University and the Italian Archaeological Mission in collaboration with the provincial department of archaeology and museums.

As per Prof Luca M Olivieri who is the director of Italian Mission, “it is possible to date the foundation of the Buddhist sacred structure to the Mauryan period, certainly to the 3rd century BC.”

ASIA, CHINA, WORLD

The MINI terracotta army: Hundreds of small warrior statues found in a 2100-year-old pit in China

The MINI terracotta army: Hundreds of small warrior statues found in 2100-year-old pit in China

Inside a 2,100-year-old pit in China, archaeologists have discovered a miniature army of sorts: carefully arranged chariots and mini statues of cavalry, watchtowers, infantry and musicians.

They look like a miniaturized version of the Terracotta Army — a collection of chariots and life-size sculptures of soldiers, horses, entertainers and civil officials — that was constructed for Qin Shi Huang, the first emperor of China.

Based on the design of the newfound artefacts, archaeologists believe that the pit was created about 2,100 years ago, or about a century after the construction of the Terracotta Army.

The southern part of the pit is filled with formations of cavalry and chariots, along with models of watchtowers that stand 55 inches (140 centimetres) high. At the pit’s centre, about 300 infantrymen stand alert in a square formation, while the northern part of the pit has a model of a theatrical pavilion holding small sculptures of musicians.

“The form and scale of the pit suggest that it accompanies a large burial site,” wrote archaeologists in a paper published recently in the journal Chinese Cultural Relics.

The MINI terracotta army: Hundreds of small warrior statues found in 2100-year-old pit in China
A 2,100-year-old pit containing a mini “Terracotta Army” has been discovered in China.

The “vehicles, cavalry and infantry in square formation were reserved for burials of the monarchs or meritorious officials or princes,” the archaeologists wrote.

The soldiers and cavalry in the newly discovered army are much smaller than those in the Terracotta Army. Based on the date, size and location of the pit, archaeologists believe that this newly discovered army may have been built for Liu Hong, a prince of Qi (a part of China), who was the son of Emperor Wu (reign 141–87 B.C.).

Hong was based in Linzi, a Chinese city near the newly discovered pit; he died in 110 B.C. “Textual sources record that Liu Hong was installed as the prince of Qi when he was quite young, and he, unfortunately, died early, without an heir,” archaeologists wrote in the journal article. Shortly before Hong’s death, according to writings by ancient historian Ban Gu, a comet appeared in the sky over China.

Where is the tomb?

If the pit and its ceramic army were meant to protect Liu Hong, or another senior royal family member, in the afterlife, then a tomb should be located nearby, the archaeologists wrote.

“There are possibly architectural remains or a path leading from the pit, but there is no way to explore the main burial chamber,” the researchers wrote, noting that the tomb itself may have been destroyed. 

Older residents in the area have reported descriptions of a prominent earthen mound, some 13 feet (4 meters) high, near the pit, the study authors wrote. “Sometime in the 1960s or 1970s, workers removed the earth and flattened the area in order to widen the Jiaonan-Jinan Railway.”

The reports are corroborated by an aerial photograph taken in 1938 by the Japanese Air Force (at that time, Japan was at war with China). This picture shows a possible burial mound near the railway, the archaeologists noted.

From life size to mini-warriors

The Terracotta Army pits found beside the tomb of the first emperor of China are the only known examples of an army of life-size ceramic soldiers in China.

Shortly after the first emperor’s 210 B.C. death, his dynasty, known as the Qin dynasty, collapsed and a new dynasty, known as the Han, took over China. 

Some of the Han dynasty rulers continued to build pits with armies of ceramic soldiers for their burials, but the soldiers were considerably smaller. For instance, the infantry sculptures in the newly discovered pit are between 9 and 12 inches (22 and 31 cm) tall, nowhere near the heights of the life-size soldiers buried near the tomb of the first emperor.

The pit, along with several other archaeological sites, was discovered in the winter of 2007 during construction work. After its discovery, the pit was excavated by the Cultural Relics Agency of Linzi District of Zibo city.

After excavation was complete, archaeologists from this agency analyzed the artefacts, working with researchers from the Shandong Provincial Institute of Cultural Relics and Archaeology.

A report on the pit was first published, in Chinese, in 2016, in the journal Wenwu. This report was recently translated into English and published in the journal Chinese Cultural Relics.