(Santa Fe New Mexican) Diana Heil - When archaeologists unearthed floors at Tel Dor in Israel this summer, they thought they were looking at plaster. But scientists from the Weizmann Institute of Science found the floors covered with phytolites, the tiny hairs on grass and leaves that survive after a plant dies. The Weizmann Institute was brought into the dig to take its own samples and see if its instruments could endure the dust at the site. Next season, physicists, biologists, and materials analysts will work in a systematic way with archaeologists for the first time at a dig in Israel. The Weizmann Institute's Kimmel Center for Archaeological Science, directed by biologist Steve Weiner, is one of the few graduate research centers devoted to scientific archaeology.
2004-09-24 00:00:00Full ArticleBACK Visit the Daily Alert Archive