[Aztlan] NO: Photon Activation Traces Trade Roues in North America

[Bruce Rogers]

Scientists Retrace Indian Trade Routes
Pocatello, Idaho - Idaho State University anthropologists are 
retracing American Indian trade routes by bombarding arrowheads and 
other stone tools with radiation that helps locate their origins.

The work at the Idaho Accelerator Center in Pocatello involves a 
process called photon activation analysis. It allows researchers to 
measure trace elements in an object and use the data to match 
artifacts with their places of origin, such as matching arrowheads 
made of obsidian with the lava flows they came from. That can provide 
evidence about how such items were passed among the West's tribes.

"This is the only accelerator center in the world doing this kind of 
work," ISU Anthropology Professor Herb Maschner told the Idaho State 
Journal.

The same results can be gained by drilling holes into the artifacts 
and irradiating them inside nuclear reactors, Maschner said. But that 
means the artifacts must be treated as nuclear waste afterward. The 
photo activation method causes no damage, he said.

The University's Physics and Anthropology Departments began 
collaborating on the project about two years ago. Maschner wanted to 
trace the origins of the artifacts found by anthropologist and tribal 
members in the Aleutian Islands, and former Idaho Accelerator Center 
Director Frank Harmon told the professor he had a technique that 
could work without destroying the objects.

Maschner and Harmon began their project by irradiating rocks to see 
if they could get an elemental fingerprint. When they found the 
process worked, they added quality controls and did a little 
fine-tuning before starting on the artifacts.

Buck Benson, an ISU graduate student and Maschner's assistant, said 
the scientists experimented with obsidian and rocks from the lava 
flows in southeastern Idaho, discovering they could accurately match 
samples to particular flows.
The scientists know the obsidian in Maschner's arrowheads came from 
particular volcanoes in Alaska, but they hope to learn which 
arrowheads correspond with which volcanoes.

Their project uses a medical grade accelerator designed for cancer 
therapy. It shoots 25 million volts of electricity into a block that 
converts the current into gamma rays before it passes through the 
stone artifacts, which rotate in small containers on a turntable for 
a period of four hours.

"It changes the composition slightly to make them radioactive so we 
can measure the elements," Maschner said.
Afterward, the objects are set aside for a few days until they are 
radiation free and they can then be returned to the tribes.

Information from: Atlanta Journal Constitution and Idaho State Journal

http://tinyurl.com/37s3x8