While the scientific fields of planetary geology and archaeology don’t initially seem like a natural pairing, their unique methodological and technological overlap provides scientists with a better understanding of geological processes impacting both fields. The tools used to understand site formation on Earth and other planetary bodies has the potential to inform future research in both fields.
Labroots recently had the privilege of speaking with Dr. Timothy Scarlett, Associate Professor of Archaeology and Anthropology in the Department of Social Sciences at Michigan Technological University, regarding the incorporation of archaeological methods with those used by planetary geologists. We discussed how he uses these tools, and how he foresees these methods advancing -and others- impacting the future of archaeological research.
Laurence Tognetti: How do you see the methods used by planetary geologists being incorporated into archaeological methods (i.e., tools, technology, etc)?
Dr. Timothy Scarlett: Geoarchaeology is a really mature field within archaeology, as are the group of methods we call “Landscape Archaeology.” Throughout my career, geoarchaeology has been fundamental to the way I see archaeology- from microscope- or chemistry-based sediment and soil analyses on up to evolving landforms in geomorphology. More recently some archaeologists are engaged in climate and planetary science, ranging from glaciology and climate change into new areas of science like paleoecology and planetary boundaries.
Archaeologists have always applied the tools and practices of geology to help us understand our limited data- going all the way back to the earliest scholars in the 18th and 19th centuries. I’m an industrial archaeologist, however, and my research and teaching are usually aimed at archaeological insights into the past two or three hundred years of time on the planet, rather than thousands or millions of years.
The revolutions in archaeology right now are driven by tools that give us more and more scale for analysis- scales of space and time and depth (although they are really just accelerating evolutions, rather than revolutions). We have more data from tools— like LiDAR providing tremendous quantifies of geomorphological and cultural landscape data; high resolution satellite images and other remote sensing tech like SAR and multi- and hyper spectral imaging; computer analysis of huge numbers of sites recorded from thousands of surveys and studies. Just like biomolecular data from ancient and environmental DNA and proteomics, none of this is totally new. But it is more accessible and more affordable than ever before. We just know more and can analyze more than ever before in the human experience! It is an exciting time to be an archaeologist.
My research falls into the cracks in all this exciting change. I mean that in the best way. I don’t do planetary science myself, but industrial archaeology allows me to connect research tools and scientists and scholars in new ways and push our work in new directions.
Laurence Tognetti: How have you personally used some of those tools and methods in your own work? And what was the result?
Dr. Timothy Scarlett: Take robotic science, computer vision, algorithmic analysis, and remote sensing as a set of examples. There is a convergence happening in these areas and I’m leading some of this work in unexpected directions.
When I was in grad school, you had to be working in collaboration with NASA to have access to Geographic Information Systems platforms and you could only work on restricted-access hardwired terminals to study data. Now more different kinds of sensing are available, for less cost, on more platforms, and with user-friendly interfaces- so many more people can do work with digital tools to study heritage sites, monuments, objects, and landscapes, and they can share them really widely in virtual and physical communities.
Among these examples in my own work—I have been studying the archaeology of mining and mining communities for thirty years. I had been doing conventional industrial archaeology—mapping the changing technological systems of extraction, looking at the boom and bust of communities, understanding the social and ecological costs of extractive wealth production and the cultural and legal systems by which these are organized. In the past few years, however, I can see people combining ideas and technologies and belief systems that forced me to rethink the entire practice of mining archaeology.
Dr. Scarlett and a survey rover as part of a NASA project called LuSTR (Lunar Surface Technology Research) designed to measure water ice content within simulated lunar regolith. (Credit: Timothy Scarlett)
Instead of thinking of my field as a way to study and understand how humans have extracted resources from their environments over time (which is still a great goal) OR as a way to manage or prevent the destruction of archaeological heritage sites during newly developing extractive activities (another noble objective), I am helping communities to do use archaeology to steer the transformation of their energy infrastructure amid a changing world. I’m making archaeology a tool for building real, physical projects and infrastructure that will fight climate change and help future humans thrive within planetary limits.
People are applying specific tools in different contexts in subterranean and underwater archaeology, using innovative platforms and sensor arrays to study historic and ancient sites. Those could be combined with evolving techniques in machine learning, image processing, and autonomous robotic systems to get us past those barriers. There are many companies in the marketplace with established (PSH and PUSH) and emerging energy technology systems in abandoned mine geothermal and in various forms of underground gravity-based energy storage.
Dr. Scarlett at a Keweenaw post-mining community as part of the PUSH (Pumped Underground Storage Hydropower) project, which is a global project designed to reduce our need for fossil fuels and issues from abandoned mines. (Credit: Michigan Technological University)
These are all major opportunities to redress past social and ecological injustices and heal ongoing environmental legacies, while transforming our energy infrastructure to serve the next century. Many communities might be attracted to these technologies in principle, but investors shy away from them because of the unknowns- they don’t know the condition of the underground without spending millions of dollars to “dewater” (i.e. drain) a mine and send people into that dangerous environment to study it. It would be a safer bet to build new, cutting into green spaces and adding new transmission.
I am leading some teams and supporting others as we try to develop automated image processing and machine learning tools that can convert libraries of old blueprints and field sketches into functional 3D models of underground spaces. At the same time, we need autonomous and remotely-operated robotic platforms that can operate in the extremely hazardous flooded or dry underground environments. Between these two tools, we will soon be able to map ancient and historic mines “as designed” and “as is” so we can better research the underground taskscapes of mining labor and human activities, better manage those resources with communities, and even think of creative ways to reuse them to keep the heritage alive in living communities.
Laurence Tognetti: Do you think more archaeologists will be incorporating these methods and tools in future work? Specifically with regards to non-invasive imaging.
Dr. Timothy Scarlett: Absolutely. As the costs come down and funds to do archaeology are shrinking and/or (at best) flat, people need any innovative tool they can get their hands on. And as an example, I often inherit sensors or platforms that other scientists have replaced with the “newest and best” versions. Their older gear, while it has slightly less precision or resolution than next year’s model, will work perfectly well for us in archaeology!
The leadership team of the Keweenaw Energy Transition Lab comprised of Roman Sidortsov (foreground), Ana Dyreson (right), Shardul Tiwari (center), and Dr. Scarlett (background center). This photo was taken as the team was entering the Arctic Circle to conduct a PUSH-themed study near Kiruna, Sweden. (Credit: Timothy Scarlett)
Laurence Tognetti: In broader terms, how do you feel archaeology utilizes the technologies and tools of other fields?
Dr. Timothy Scarlett: Archaeologists borrow and steal with wild abandon. We adopt ideas from the sciences, but also from history and the humanities and the arts. We love new ideas and new tools- “what would happen if…” is a common phrase. Or “let’s just try this and see what happens…”
That has wonderful outcomes but also costs. Archaeologists will play with a new technology or technique or idea, but it will take some time to figure out the important questions:
Do we really need to know this? Why is this data important or useful? Why is it worthwhile to organize my inquiry in this way? Sometimes we will play with a tool and then put it aside after realizing that it has limited utility. But often that play results in substantial progress in our field- LiDAR is a great example. Not revolutionary, but rather a punctuated event in the evolution of landscape archaeology.
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Dr. Scarlett and other archaeologists working with imaging know that the unlikely, but complementary, ‘borrowing’ of tools and methodologies from other fields can inform archaeological research in new and exciting ways. One example that interests this writer is the continued pairing of planetary geology and archaeology and the preservation of space heritage on the Moon and Mars, specifically the Apollo landers on the Moon and expired rovers on the surface of Mars. Preserving these artifacts could provide future generations with insightful history about the early days of space exploration.
You can connect with Dr. Timothy Scarlett on LinkedIn or read more about his work at Michigan Technological University here.