Archaeology & History

Scientists to conduct new scans of the Great Pyramid

By T.K. Randall
March 21, 2022 ·  3 comments

What lies inside the Great Pyramid ? Image Credit: CC BY-SA 3.0 Nina Aldin Thune Rising 146 meters into the sky, this last surviving wonder of the ancient world, which has stood in the Egyptian desert for 3,800 years, remains just as steeped in mystery today as when ancient travellers first gazed up at its time-worn stonework and wondered what secrets might lie inside.

In more recent years, rumors have circulated suggesting that there could be a large hidden chamber situated within the pyramid - a room that has remained unopened since ancient times.

In 2017, scans of the structure by an international team of researchers from Nagoya University and the High Energy Accelerator Research Organization seemed to confirm that this was the case, however a great deal of skepticism has always surrounded these findings.

Now in a renewed bid to solve the mystery once and for all, scientists with the Exploring the Great Pyramid (EGP) Mission are planning to use muons to scan the structure in more detail than ever before.The endeavour follows a previous muon-based study by the ScanPyramids project which found indications of large voids within the Great Pyramid, however this time scientists will be using a next-generation muon-scanning system capable of delivering "upwards of 100 times the sensitivity" and which "will, for the first time, produce a true tomographic image of such a large structure."

"The pyramids of the Giza plateau have fascinated visitors since ancient times and are the last of the Seven Wonders of the ancient world still standing," the research team wrote.

"The Exploring the Great Pyramid (EGP) Mission presents the potential to obtain entirely new results on the internal structure of the Great Pyramid by having the precision to measure differences in density."

It will be very interesting to see what, if anything, the team discovers.

Source: Vice.com | Comments (3)

Tags: Pyramid