Related papers: Arabia: from craters to stone circles
On the Andean highlands, the "qochas" are lakes or ponds of natural or artificial origin. An ancient agricultural technique is based on their use. Linked together by a network of canals, qochas form a system of water and soil management,…
Interesting landforms created by an ancient network of earthworks are shown, using Google satellite imagery enhanced by an image processing. This network covers a large part of the land near the Titicaca Lake. Satellite images clearly…
Several methods exist for surveying the dunes and estimate their migration rate. Among methods suitable for the macroscopic scale, the use of the satellite images available on Google Earth is a convenient resource, in particular because of…
The Gaia mission has revolutionized our view of the Milky Way and its satellite citizens. The field of Galactic Archaeology has been piecing together the formation and evolution of the Galaxy for decades, and we have made great strides,…
In several desert areas, the slow motion of sand dunes can be a challenge for modern human activities and a threat for the survival of ancient places or archaeological sites. However, several methods exist for surveying the dune fields and…
It is known since the 19 century that in the layout of the pyramid field of the pharaohs of the 4 th Egyptian dynasty at Giza, a main axis exists. Indeed, the south-east corners of these monuments align towards the site of the temple of…
Vesta has a complex cratering history, with ancient terrains as well as recent large impacts that have led to regional resurfacing. Crater counts can help constrain the relative ages of different units on Vesta's surface, but converting…
Advances in the discovery and characterization of asteroids over the past decade have revealed an unanticipated underlying structure that points to a dramatic early history of the inner Solar System. The asteroids in the main asteroid belt…
The Gulf of Eilat (Gulf of Aqaba) is a semi-enclosed basin situated at the northern end of the Red Sea, renowned for its exceptional marine ecosystem. To evaluate the response of the Gulf to climate variations, we analyzed various factors…
The architectural complexes composed by the two main pyramids of Giza together with their temples are investigated from an inter-disciplinary point of view, taking into account their astronomical alignments as well as their relationships…
Jupiter's banded appearance may appear unchanging to the casual observer, but closer inspection reveals a dynamic, ever-changing system of belts and zones with distinct cycles of activity. Identification of these long-term cycles requires…
The asteroid belt was dynamically shaped during and after planet formation. Despite representing a broad ring of stable orbits, the belt contains less than one one-thousandth of an Earth mass. The asteroid orbits are dynamically excited…
Google Earth is a huge source of interesting illustrations of various natural phenomena. It can represent a valuable tool for science education, not only for teaching geography and geology, but also physics. Here we suggest that Google…
A recently discovered group of nearby co-orbital objects is an attractive location for extraterrestrial intelligence (ETI) to locate a probe to observe Earth while not being easily seen. These near-Earth objects provide an ideal way to…
(Abridged) Planets are surrounded by fractal surfaces (traditionally called Hill spheres), separating the inner zones of long-term stable orbital motion of their satellites from the outer space where the gravitational pull from the Sun…
Traditional Aboriginal Australian cultures include a significant astronomical component, perpetuated through oral tradition and ceremony. This knowledge has practical navigational and calendrical functions, and sometimes extends to a deep…
The natural radionuclide (Ra^222, Th^232, and 40K) contents were determined for seven locations over the whole Wadi Arar at north of Saudi Arabia, using gamma-spectrometry analysis. The range of activity concentrations of Ra^226, Th^232,…
Aboriginal stories dating back many thousands of years talk of a fire from the sky in an area now home to the Henbury meteorite craters, in the Northern Territory
We report the discovery and initial characterization of Qatar-2b, a hot Jupiter transiting a V = 13.3 mag K dwarf in a circular orbit with a short period, P_ b = 1.34 days. The mass and radius of Qatar-2b are M_p = 2.49 M_j and R_p = 1.14…
Prior studies have hypothesized that some polluted white dwarfs record continent-like granitic crust--which is abundant on Earth and perhaps uniquely indicative of plate tectonics. But these inferences derive from only a few elements, none…