Brent Seales, a professor at the University of Kentucky, has developed groundbreaking technology to read ancient scrolls that cannot be opened without damage. His work, part of the Vesuvius Challenge, has led to the digital unrolling of scrolls from Herculaneum, a town buried by Mount Vesuvius in 79 AD. Using a technique called Volume Cartographer, Seales and his team have successfully read scrolls like PHerc 1667 by converting 3D scans into 2D images. This achievement was accelerated by artificial intelligence, which helped automate the process of detecting ink within the scans. The scrolls, preserved by volcanic ash, were found in the Villa dei Papiri and are now readable thanks to this innovative technology. This discovery not only unlocks ancient texts but also showcases the potential of AI in historical research.
QUESTION: How might the ability to read ancient texts without opening them change our understanding of history?
Ancient Roman scrolls destroyed by Mount Vesuvius digitally unrolled in full for first time
