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Scientists Map an Unexplored Corridor of Egypt's Great Pyramid Using Cosmic Rays
Thanks to cosmic rays, secrets of the last remaining Wonder of the Ancient World are being revealed.
CNet ^
| March 2, 2023 4:01 a.m. PT
| Jackson Ryan
Posted on 03/02/2023 12:41:14 PM PST by Red Badger
Thanks to cosmic rays, secrets of the last remaining Wonder of the Ancient World are being revealed.
The Great Pyramid of Giza, the largest of Egypt's famous landmarks, has stood tall for around 4,500 years. But the 2 million blocks that make up the tomb and fortress have not been impenetrable. Looters robbed the structure of its ancient treasures thousands of years ago and scientists have probed its interiors either by studying its corridors or with more advanced measuring techniques like thermal scanners.
The structure still holds many secrets, but since 2015 an international team of scientists, the ScanPyramids team, has been using subatomic particles to probe the unknowns of the monument. In 2017, they revealed a huge void -- creatively dubbed the Big Void -- situated above the pyramid's gallery, though the purpose of this void remains unknown.
On Thursday, in a study published in the journal Nature Communications, the team characterizes the structure of this corridor by taking advantage of the cosmic rays that constantly smash into the Earth.
Cosmic ray muons, a subatomic particle considered one of the most basic building blocks of the universe, pass through Earth's atmosphere and sometimes collide with solid matter on the ground. A given object's density and thickness determine how the muon is absorbed by the object -- and that's measurable.
Two teams installed seven detectors inside two corridors of the pyramid over a period of three years, from 2016 to 2019, that were able to capture these muons. The direction in which these muons smash into the detector is useful to determine what matter they passed through before they were detected. This is how the team was able to first discover the North Face Corridor and then characterize its features.
Their measurements show that the North Face Corridor sits about 2.6 feet behind the North Face Chevron, an interesting structure just above the modern-day public entrance to the pyramid with a currently unknown role. The corridor itself is likely 27 feet in length and pipe-shaped and runs horizontal to the ground. It also appears to have a larger cross-section than other corridors within the Great Pyramid and, at least from this measurement, it appears unlikely to connect to the Big Void previously detected by the ScanPyramids team.
It's a particularly intriguing find because the North Face Chevron was once hidden behind the outer layer of casing stones on the pyramid. Why hide these chevrons? What were they for? Why is there a corridor behind them?
It seems every time scientists probe the Great Pyramid's hidden pathways and seemingly empty spaces, they find more questions.
TOPICS: Education; History; Science; Travel
KEYWORDS: egypt; ggg; giza; godsgravesglyphs; muography; muons; scanpyramids; zahihawass; zowiehawass
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To: Pearls Before Swine
If I remember correctly, Jack Hawkins played the Pharoh in the movie.
To: Boogieman
I suppose if you ignore the evidence that someone pried open the “sarcophagus”
—
And you have proof that it was an actual sarcophagus? Proof that it was used as such? Proof that someone pried it open, and it was not originally that way? How do you know it ever had a lid? Or just assumption and conjecture? None of the theories presented are evidence of anything, except they exist.
You are of course aware that the inside of the so-called sarcophagus has been measured as machined smooth and the corners to within small fractions of true right angles? If it was as you say, why would anyone go to that trouble for something never seen? Like the many huge sarcophagi at the Serapeum of Saqqara?
You seem to have swallowed the prevailing consensus thinking whole.
Keep an open mind, deal with what you see, and leave aside conjecture, assumptions and theories which cannot be proved.
42
posted on
03/03/2023 4:04:51 AM PST
by
PIF
(They came for me and mine ... now its your turn)
To: PIF
“And you have proof that it was an actual sarcophagus?”
No, that’s why I put “sarcophagus” in quotes.
“Proof that someone pried it open, and it was not originally that way?”
When you have a corner broken off, a missing lid, tool marks, and a matching box in the next pyramid over that has no broken corner, a non-missing lid, and no tool marks, then I think the idea that it was pried open and the lid is missing is the default hypothesis, and any other hypothesis is the one that needs to justify itself.
“Or just assumption and conjecture?”
Everything is assumption and conjecture when it comes to archaeology, until we find some written documents or something like that. However, there is assumption and conjecture with varying reasonable degrees of likelihood.
“You are of course aware that the inside of the so-called sarcophagus has been measured as machined smooth and the corners to within small fractions of true right angles?”
No, you can’t argue that and also argue that the broken corner might have been meant to be that way. Those are two contradictory arguments. Pick one.
“You seem to have swallowed the prevailing consensus thinking whole.”
I have not, I just don’t swallow every popular theory that is designed mainly to sell books to ignorant people rather than to hold up to scrutiny.
To: Red Badger
Thanks Red Badger.
44
posted on
03/03/2023 6:42:15 AM PST
by
SunkenCiv
(Imagine an imaginary menagerie manager imagining managing an imaginary menagerie.)
The Jean-Pierre Houdin keyword, sorted:
45
posted on
03/03/2023 8:52:30 AM PST
by
SunkenCiv
(Imagine an imaginary menagerie manager imagining managing an imaginary menagerie.)
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