Hasil untuk "Prehistoric archaeology"

Lorenzo Monti, Tatiana Muraveva, Brian Sheridan et al.

In data-driven scientific discovery, a challenge lies in classifying well-characterized phenomena while identifying novel anomalies. Current semi-supervised clustering algorithms do not always fully address this duality, often assuming that supervisory signals are globally representative. Consequently, methods often enforce rigid constraints that suppress unanticipated patterns or require a pre-specified number of clusters, rendering them ineffective for genuine novelty detection. To bridge this gap, we introduce CLiMB (CLustering in Multiphase Boundaries), a domain-informed framework decoupling the exploitation of prior knowledge from the exploration of unknown structures. Using a sequential two-phase approach, CLiMB first anchors known clusters using metric-adaptive constrained partitioning, and subsequently applies density-based clustering to residual data to reveal arbitrary topologies. We demonstrate this framework on RR Lyrae stars data from the Gaia Data Release 3. CLiMB attains an Adjusted Rand Index of 0.829 with 90% seed coverage in recovering known Milky Way substructures, outperforming heuristic and constraint-based baselines, which stagnate below 0.20. Furthermore, sensitivity analysis confirms CLiMB's superior data efficiency, showing monotonic improvement as knowledge increases. Finally, the framework successfully isolates three distinct dynamical features (Shiva, Shakti, and the Galactic Disk) in the unlabelled field, validating its potential for scientific discovery.

C. Charbonnel, N. Prantzos

Lithium plays a unique role in astrophysics, as it is a powerful diagnostic for the physics and evolution of low-mass stars, Galactic archaeology, and cosmology. We review the Li observations in stars at different phases of their evolution, the strengths and the limitations of the current theoretical stellar models to explain the Li abundance data, our understanding of the Li sources and of the evolution of Li through- out the Galactic history. Key takeaways from the current state of the research in the field are: 1) Stellar evolution models accounting for fundamental transport processes of chemical species and angular momentum hold the promise of providing a common stellar Li depletion explanation to the Li abundance patterns observed in all Galactic stellar populations, including the dip and the plateau(s). 2) Novae are most probably the main source of Li in the Galaxy, on observational (but not yet theoretically established) grounds. 3) Radial migration of stars in the Galactic disk holds the key to understand many aspects of the Li evolution in the Milky Way.

Maria Rueda Prunell

Este artículo se centra en la problemática del sellado de los dolia, en concreto, sobre aquellos recipientes con dos sellos. Además de hipotetizar el motivo de dicho sellado, se describen los fragmentos de dolia con dos sellos encontrados en la actual zona catalana, intentando relacionarlos con los personajes aparecidos en la epigrafía monumental, principalmente de las ciudades de Barcino y Tarraco, así como en la epigrafía anfórica. Aunque la mayoría de estos sellos ya habían sido publicados anteriormente en corpus más generales, este artículo pretende agrupar este fenómeno del doble sellado, darle una posible explicación, además de presentar algunas marcas inéditas.

Atreyee Bhattacharya, S. Sarkar, J.S. Leonard-Pingel et al.

Jincheng Zhang, William Ringle, Andrew R. Willis

Manual identification of archaeological features in LiDAR imagery is labor-intensive, costly, and requires archaeological expertise. This paper shows how recent advancements in deep learning (DL) present efficient solutions for accurately segmenting archaeological structures in aerial LiDAR images using the YOLOv8 neural network. The proposed approach uses novel pre-processing of the raw LiDAR data and dataset augmentation methods to produce trained YOLOv8 networks to improve accuracy, precision, and recall for the segmentation of two important Maya structure types: annular structures and platforms. The results show an IoU performance of 0.842 for platforms and 0.809 for annular structures which outperform existing approaches. Further, analysis via domain experts considers the topological consistency of segmented regions and performance vs. area providing important insights. The approach automates time-consuming LiDAR image labeling which significantly accelerates accurate analysis of historical landscapes.

S. Buder, J. Kos, E. X. Wang et al.

The stars of the Milky Way carry the chemical history of our Galaxy in their atmospheres as they journey through its vast expanse. Like barcodes, we can extract the chemical fingerprints of stars from high-resolution spectroscopy. The fourth data release (DR4) of the Galactic Archaeology with HERMES (GALAH) Survey, based on a decade of observations, provides the chemical abundances of up to 32 elements for 917 588 stars that also have exquisite astrometric data from the $Gaia$ satellite. For the first time, these elements include life-essential nitrogen to complement carbon, and oxygen as well as more measurements of rare-earth elements critical to modern-life electronics, offering unparalleled insights into the chemical composition of the Milky Way. For this release, we use neural networks to simultaneously fit stellar parameters and abundances across the whole wavelength range, leveraging synthetic grids computed with Spectroscopy Made Easy. These grids account for atomic line formation in non-local thermodynamic equilibrium for 14 elements. In a two-iteration process, we first fit stellar labels to all 1 085 520 spectra, then co-add repeated observations and refine these labels using astrometric data from $Gaia$ and 2MASS photometry, improving the accuracy and precision of stellar parameters and abundances. Our validation thoroughly assesses the reliability of spectroscopic measurements and highlights key caveats. GALAH DR4 represents yet another milestone in Galactic archaeology, combining detailed chemical compositions from multiple nucleosynthetic channels with kinematic information and age estimates. The resulting dataset, covering nearly a million stars, opens new avenues for understanding not only the chemical and dynamical history of the Milky Way, but also the broader questions of the origin of elements and the evolution of planets, stars, and galaxies.

Patrick J. Park, Sebastian Herzele, Timothy W. Koeth

We re-examine a common narrative that experimental errors by Walther Bothe in 1941 led Germany to abandon graphite as a reactor moderator during World War II. Using document-based nuclear archaeology, we first show that both American and German scientists used an incorrect carbon scattering cross section, thereby undermining the accuracy of all wartime data, including their conclusions on carbon's absorption. Moreover, we argue that the availability of exceptionally pure petroleum coke in the United States, rather than any academic breakthrough, decisively enabled their production of nuclear-grade graphite. In contrast, Bothe's Siemens electrographite had more boron contamination than any graphites considered in Fermi's experiments, rendering it genuinely impractical as a moderator. By reframing the decision to eschew graphite as a deliberate decision rather than a mere experimental oversight, we believe the German decision was a rational consequence of a complex interplay between material constraints and wartime priorities.

Tullio Basaglia, Zane W. Bell, Daniele D'Agostino et al.

Geant4 is an object-oriented toolkit for the simulation of the passage of particles through matter. Its development was initially motivated by the requirements of physics experiments at high energy hadron colliders under construction in the last decade of the 20th century. Since its release in 1998, it has been exploited in many different applicative fields, including space science, nuclear physics, medical physics and archaeology. Its valuable support to scientific discovery is demonstrated by more than 16000 citations received in the past 25 years, including notable citations for main discoveries in different fields. This accomplishment shows that well designed software plays a key role in enabling scientific advancement. In this paper we discuss the key principles and the innovative decisions at the basis of Geant4, which made it a game changer in high energy physics and related fields, and outline some considerations regarding future directions.

Arianna Vasini, Emanuele Spitoni, Francesca Matteucci

The diagram depicting the abundance ratios [Mg/Mn] vs. [Al/Fe] has gained attention in recent literature as a valuable tool for exploring fundamental aspects of the evolution of the Milky Way and the Local Group. In particular, this combination of elements is supposed to be highly sensitive to the star formation history (SFH), unveiled by the imprints left on those abundances. Unfortunately, a complete discussion on the uncertainties associated is still missing, making it difficult to know how reliable the associated results are. In this paper we analyze, by means of detailed chemical evolution models, the nuclear uncertainties of Mg, Al, Mn and Fe to show how different yields can affect the trends in the [Mg/Mn] vs. [Al/Fe] plane. In fact, if different yield assumptions produce conflicting results, then the [Mg/Mn] vs. [Al/Fe] diagram does not represent a strong diagnostic for the SFH of a galaxy. We discuss the results on the [Mg/Mn] vs. [Al/Fe] diagram, as predicted by several Milky Way (MW) and Large Magellanic Cloud (LMC) chemical evolution models adopting different nucleosynthesis prescriptions. The results show that the literature yields require some corrective factors to reproduce the APOGEE DR17 abundances of Mg, Al and Mn in the MW and that the same factors can also improve the results for the LMC. In particular, we show that by modifying the massive stars yields of Mg and Al the behaviour of the [Mg/Mn] vs. [Al/Fe] plot changes substantially. In conclusion, by changing the yields within their error bars, one obtains trends which differ strongly, making it difficult to draw any reliable conclusion on the SFH of galaxies. The proposed diagram is therefore uncertain from a theoretical point of view and it could represent a good diagnostic for SFH if the uncertainties on the nucleosynthesis of these elements (Mg, Mn, Al and Fe) could be reduced by future stellar calculations.

Amrutha Samalan, Samip Basnet, Eduardo Cortina Gil et al.

Muography is finding applications in various domains such as volcanology, archaeology, civil engineering, industry, mining, and nuclear waste surveys. To simplify transportation and installation in remote locations after laboratory testing, a fully portable and autonomous muon telescope based on Resistive Plate Chambers (RPCs) is being developed. Two glass-RPC prototypes have been created, sharing the same design goals but with different detector parameters, and comparative studies are ongoing. Drawing from prototype experience, a double-gap RPC with advanced features and improved spatial resolution is constructed. Resistive electrodes are produced manually, and a new data acquisition board is currently undergoing calibration. The results on prototype performance, readout board comparisons and the technical progress on the double-gap RPC are presented.

Hanna Kowalewska-Marszałek

-

Simone Parisotto, Ninetta Leone, Carola-Bibiane Schönlieb et al.

In this paper we propose an artificial intelligence imaging solution to support archaeologists in the classification task of Roman commonware potsherds. Usually, each potsherd is represented by its sectional profile as a two dimensional black-white image and printed in archaeological books related to specific archaeological excavations. The partiality and handcrafted variance of the fragments make their matching a challenging problem: we propose to pair similar profiles via the unsupervised hierarchical clustering of non-linear features learned in the latent space of a deep convolutional Variational Autoencoder (VAE) network. Our contribution also include the creation of a ROman COmmonware POTtery (ROCOPOT) database, with more than 4000 potsherds profiles extracted from 25 Roman pottery corpora, and a MATLAB GUI software for the easy inspection of shape similarities. Results are commented both from a mathematical and archaeological perspective so as to unlock new research directions in both communities.

Jon Baczkowski

This paper will summarise evidence for Late Neolithic and Early Bronze Age flint extraction at the Southern English mines, beginning with a brief synopsis of their chronology and followed by a summary of mine lithics. It is argued that understanding later mining is equally important as examining its beginning, because the Neolithic is framed by the pursuit of flint from deep mines with significant episodes of extraction at its beginning and end. A focus is maintained on the flint mines located in the county of Sussex because these are the best researched of the English mines. This research represents a limited study of the Late Neolithic/Early Bronze Age activity at the Early Neolithic mines, because it is far from exhaustive. Nonetheless, this paper will attempt to define the Late Neolithic and Bronze Age flint working activity at the mines and will question if this activity is associated with new episodes of shaft-mining or informal methods of extraction, such as quarrying or surface collection of earlier mine waste.

Yuichi I. Naito, Miriam Belmaker, Francisco J. Jiménez-Espejo et al.

During the Last Glacial Maximum and deglaciation, the Iberian Peninsula served as a faunal and human population refugium. Human foodways have always played a pivotal role in understanding social and cultural practices in prehistory. Nonetheless, the limited number of archaeological sites and human remains in this region hinders the complete understanding of these critical communities’ diet. To increase our knowledge about human consumption patterns, we selected three Magdalenian levels from the site of El Pirulejo (Southern Iberia Peninsula, Spain). These levels are characterized by a high abundance of rabbit (Oryctolagus cuniculus) remains (76–97% MNI), initially suggesting that rabbits were the primary source of protein for site inhabitants. Stable isotope analysis was conducted on two human teeth in tandem with stable isotope analysis of the rabbit teeth. Contrary to the expectations derived from the zooarchaeological analysis, rabbits were not a significant source of dietary protein. Carbon and nitrogen bulk isotopic values are the most enriched found in sampled human remains for this area and context. Our data supports aquatic food resource inclusion and increased resource diversity among Iberian hunter-gatherers during the Magdalenian. This study is consistent with previous studies that suggested a socio-economic network among human groups between inland and coastal regions in the terminal Pleistocene Southern Iberia.

Andrés Gascue, Noelia Bortolotto, Daniel Loponte et al.

En este trabajo se presenta una revisión de los materiales cerámicos, líticos y óseos de la colección Oliveras, recuperados del sitio Cañada Saldaña en la década de 1950. Complementariamente, se aportan nuevos datos contextuales y cronológicos obtenidos a partir de recientes trabajos de campo y laboratorio. El sitio se ubica en la margen izquierda del río Uruguay (República Oriental de Uruguay, Departamento de Soriano) sobre un antiguo cordón litoral formado a partir del descenso del nivel del mar luego del máximo transgresivo holoceno. El conjunto arqueológico recuperado fue generado por cazadores-recolectores del Holoceno tardío, que presentan numerosos puntos de contacto con los contextos más tardíos genéricamente conocidos como “Goya-Malabrigo”. Los fechados radiocarbónicos obtenidos sobre los materiales arqueológicos, señala que el sitio fue ocupado entre ca. 1900 y 1700 años 14C A.P. El contexto recuperado corresponde a un sitio de actividades múltiples, probablemente reflejando un campamento central de alta estabilidad residencial. El conjunto recuperado incluye cerámica con una gran complejidad estilística y una significativa variabilidad tipológica, instrumentos líticos incluyendo bolas de boleadora y una gran cantidad de artefactos óseos. La subsistencia del sitio estuvo basada en la explotación del efecto de borde que se genera entre la llanura del interior y el litoral fluvial. A partir del conjunto de datos contextuales y materiales obtenidos, se construyen hipótesis acerca de los procesos de formación del sitio Cañada Saldaña y se compara el registro con el de otros sitios cercanos, enmarcando la discusión dentro del panorama general de la antigüedad y distribución de estos contextos en la región.

Álvaro Martínez Alfaro, Ernestina Badal García, Aleix Eixea Vilanova et al.

El Abric de la Ratlla del Bubo (Crevillent, Alicante) es uno de los yacimientos clave para el conocimiento del Paleolítico superior en el área central del Mediterráneo ibérico, especialmente en lo que a sus fases iniciales se refiere. El yacimiento ha sido objeto de varias intervenciones arqueológicas, tanto clandestinas como científicas. Sin embargo, hasta este trabajo, la información disponible era parcial y, en muchos casos, remitía a materiales sin referencia estratigráfica. En este estudio se exponen los resultados del análisis del material lítico, del registro vegetal y de la fauna recuperada en las campañas de 1986 a 1991. Además, se presenta una amplia serie de dataciones radiocarbónicas por AMS. A partir de toda esta información, ha sido posible establecer la secuencia de ocupación de los cuatro niveles a techo de la estratigrafía del abrigo excavados durante las campañas a estudio. Los tres niveles inferiores documentados, a partir de la tecno-tipología lítica y la cronología, han podido ser definidos y relacionados con el tecnocomplejo Gravetiense. El nivel superior carece de datación 14C y ha presentado mayor dificultad de adscripción; las características del material lítico nos llevan a relacionarlo con ocupaciones del Solútreo-gravetiense. Por otro lado, una parte fundamental del trabajo son los resultados del análisis de los restos arqueobotánicos y faunísticos que son coherentes con la propuesta secuencial y permiten comprender de forma precisa la ocupación humana de la zona, además de la utilización de los recursos durante el Gravetiense y el Solútreo-gravetiense. Uno de los resultados de mayor relevancia del trabajo es que la secuencia de ocupación planteada modifica la adscripción preliminar realizada a principios de los años noventa del siglo XX. El estudio permitirá mejorar la información disponible hasta ahora para el Paleolítico superior inicial en la fachada mediterránea ibérica y, especialmente, en su área central.

Steven Ge, Toshiya Itoh

We study the imbalance problem on complete bipartite graphs. The imbalance problem is a graph layout problem and is known to be NP-complete. Graph layout problems find their applications in the optimization of networks for parallel computer architectures, VLSI circuit design, information retrieval, numerical analysis, computational biology, graph theory, scheduling and archaeology. In this paper, we give characterizations for the optimal solutions of the imbalance problem on complete bipartite graphs. Using the characterizations, we can solve the imbalance problem in $\mathcal{O}(\log(|V|) \cdot \log(\log(|V|)))$ time, when given the cardinalities of the parts of the graph, and verify whether a given solution is optimal in $O(|V|)$ time on complete bipartite graphs. We also introduce a restricted form of proper interval bipartite graphs on which the imbalance problem is solvable in $\mathcal{O}(c \cdot \log(|V|) \cdot \log(\log(|V|)))$ time, where $c = \mathcal{O}(|V|)$, by using the aforementioned characterizations.

Ana Lucía Guarido

Los entierros humanos del sitio Río Bote 1 constituyen una nueva oportunidad para estudiar el registro mortuorio en la cuenca superior del río Santa Cruz entre ca. 3800 y 3600 años AP. El objetivo de este trabajo es identificar los procesos de formación de los entierros humanos que se encontraron en dicho sitio arqueológico a partir del análisis tafonómico de sus restos óseos. Los resultados obtenidos apuntan a que los entierros presentan una preservación diferencial en relación con la edad del individuo inhumado y su posición dentro del sustrato sedimentológico. Los ciclos de incorporación de fluidos y la transformación del abrigo rocoso fueron factores fundamentales sobre los procesos diagenéticos de los entierros.

Friederike Jesse

The striking sandstone formation of Zolat el Hammad is located in the southern Libyan Desert, about halfway between the Middle Wadi Howar and El Atrun. The place has been known for its numerous rock engravings for more than a hundred years. Wild and domesticated animals as well as few human figures are depicted. Cattle engravings largely dominate, followed by giraffes and ostriches. In 1997 the first paintings were discovered in a small rock shelter. Very schematic bovids are drawn in red and white colour. However, even though it is one of the most remarkable rock art sites in this part of the Sahara, Zolat el Hammad has never been intensely studied. Observations on rock art and archaeology made during a short stay in 2001 are the basis for presenting an account of the area with the aim of encouraging further research on it.

Hamed Vahdati Nasab

Carlton Stevens Coon is one of the most prominent figures in the Prehistoric Archaeology of Iran. He conducted the first systematic field expeditions in the Iranian Archaeology 70 years ago. For many years his works have been taught in the Iranian universities. Now and after almost seventy years, a need for critical review of his works sounds inevitable. In this research, such review was performed based on five categories: theoretical approaches of the field works, degree of specialty, fieldwork approaches, data collecting methods, and data processing procedures. The results indicate that his theoretical and practical approaches have suffered from many weaknesses. Coon’s main concern was to find human remains (Neanderthals in particular) rather than conducting clean archaeology excavations. On the other hand, his horrifyingly racist publications, rumors about his employment as an intelligence operative by the CIA during the WW II and the Cold War, plus countless unanswered questions concerning the sites he chose to excavate in Iran, all support this hypothesis that Archaeology was not his first priority in Iran.