Lost Cities Better Seen From Space

With the help of new technologies NASA experts and archaeologists are discovering ancient Maya settlements in Guatemala. The potential of this project is to transform the way archeology is done, not only in Guatemala, but in Brazil, Bolivia, Cambodia or anywhere where the forest has traditionally obscured ruins from view. Seeing ruins from space changes the entire way that archeology is approach in a tropical environment.

The basic concept isn't new. In 2003, the space agency began providing Saturno's team with satellite imagery, and Saturno bought into the idea that remote sensing from space could reveal ruins that could not be seen at ground level.

Right now, it takes a human's trained eyes to identify the signature of buried Maya sites in the satellite imagery - but a computer could conceivably take on the job if the data set can be tweaked just right, Saturno said. It's all because the color differences are invisible to the naked eye. You have to identify far more subtle changes in the reflectivity of infrared wavelengths, as seen in multispectral satellite imagery.

In the near future this new approach has the target to look at the big picture of archeology by providing more accurate and valuable data for the researches in order to speed up the process of discovery.

My opinion is that not all information should be posted right in front of the public, as it will likely intrigue the grave robbers and the will rush to the remote sites long before any archaeologist do.

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