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Technology + Archaeology: Imaging into the Past with LiDAR, Drones and GIS
New technology is providing archaeologists with tools to discover information about the past. New imaging and drone technologies are making it possible to quickly map and uncover details of often hard to reach or study terrains. The aerial imaging market size is estimated to grow to more than $2.64 billion by 2022.
The ready availability of satellite images online from sites like Google Earth, Microsoft Bing Maps and NASA World Wind now means that anyone with a computer and internet connection can become an amatuer archaeologist. But there are even more sophisticated imaging tools than just standard aerial satellite imaging.
One technology that’s proving to be incredibly useful is Light Detection and Ranging (LIDAR). LIDAR is able to map areas even heavily wooded or covered with dense vegetation. The use of LIDAR has enabled “lost cities” like the “White City” in the Honduras Mosquitia to be identified.
Scott W. Anderson, Department Chair of Geography at SUNY Cortland, said that “what it’s been doing in fields like archeology is astonishing, You can go to the Amazon or places like Belize, and fly a LIDAR over it to find old Mayan ruins in moments that would take years and decades to find with a machete and burro.”
