25 MARS 2015 NEWS: Vindolanda - Horbat Siv - Blackburn - Qubbet el-Hawa - Louxor - Kushimoto - Prehistoire -
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ROYAUME UNI – 
Vindolanda - The Vindolanda excavations run this year from the 30th March to the 25th September. The team will be carrying out their operation ‘Exercise Mars Tablet’ in the late 4th Century barrack blocks within the south-east quadrant of the last stone fort, near the area where last year a volunteer at the site uncovered an exceptionally rare gold coin of the Emperor Nero.
http://www.cumbriacrack.com/2015/03/24/injured-service-personnel-to-help-uncover-roman-secrets/
ISRAEL – 
Horbat Siv - A porcupine digging a burrow unearthed a perfect 1,400-year old oil lamp – only to have its prize seized by "archaeology cops" on a routine patrol to frustrate robbers. Specifically, Israel Antiquities Authority inspectors were on their routine rounds to thwart thievery from archaeological sites, which is about as common as the artifacts themselves in the Middle East. During their visit to Horbat Siv, a site from the late Roman-Byzantine period in the Sharon area, central Israel, they noticed a remarkably well-preserved lamp lying on the rim of a porcupine burrow. The lamp had burn marks, indicating that it had once been in use.
http://www.haaretz.com/life/archaeology/1.648533
ROYAUME UNI – Blackburn – The diggers have moved in and archaeologists are on site as work begins on Blackburn’s long-awaited £4million Freckleton Street Link Road.
The work of the historical experts will finally solve the riddle of how many bodies are buried in the the former St Peter’s Church graveyard along the line of the link road. A study by Oxford Archaeology North revealed that many more people are buried in and around the graveyard than originally thought.
EGYPTE - Qubbet el-Hawa - A team from a Spanish university has discovered what Egyptian authorities are calling the world's oldest evidence of breast cancer in the 4,200-year-old skeleton of an adult woman. Antiquities Minister Mamdouh el-Damaty said the bones of the woman, who lived at the end of the 6th Pharaonic Dynasty, showed "an extraordinary deterioration". "The study of her remains shows the typical destructive damage provoked by the extension of a breast cancer as a metastasis," he said in a statement on Tuesday. Despite being one of the world's leading causes of death today, cancer is virtually absent in archaeological records compared to other diseases - which has given rise to the idea that cancers are mainly attributable to modern lifestyles and to people living for longer. But the finding, along with evidence reported last year by British researchers of metastatic cancer in a 3,000-year-old skeleton found in a tomb in modern Sudan, suggests cancer was around in the Nile Valley in ancient times. The anthropological team from the University of Jaen said the Egyptian woman was an aristocrat from Elephantine, the country's southernmost town. Her remains were discovered in the necropolis of Qubbet el-Hawa, west of the southern city of Aswan, the ministry said.
http://www.trust.org/item/20150324155920-e3at8/?
EGYPTE – 
Louxor - After five years of restoration the first and fifth Sphinxes Avenues, which once connected both Karnak and Luxor temples in ancient times, are to be opened tomorrow night for the first time.Mohamed Al-Sheikha, head of the Projects Department at the ministry of antiquities, said that the security system installed in the temple includes of an electronic curtain stretched around the temple, along with monitoring cameras connected to a TV circuit. He told Ahram Online that the restoration of the first and fifth sections of the Sphinxes Avenue represents 37 per cent of the whole path. He went on to say that the restoration work of the first section, which stretches from the Luxor temple to 350 metres long, includes the removal of all encroachment as well as the consolidation of the avenue’s eastern wall and the restoration of the sphinxes themselves. The restoration of the 600-metre-long fifth section extends from the area behind Luxor Library to the town’s airport road. Al-Sheikha pointed out that restoration is continuing on the other sections of the avenue in order to open more sections soon. The Sphinxes Avenue was the site of ceremonial processions that once connected both Luxor and Karnak temples. It is dated to around 380 BCE and stretches some 2.7 kilometers. It would have originally had 1,350 sphinxes lining both sides. Around half of those have been uncovered, with many reworked by later civilizations or sitting in museums. Much of the avenue is still covered by modern buildings.
JAPON – 
Kushimoto - A private team of Japanese and Turkish researchers has conducted its first underwater survey in five years of the Ottoman Navy frigate that sank off the coast of Kushimoto in western Japan in 1890.The Ertugrul visited Japan in 1890 to express thanks for a decoration Emperor Meiji had sent to the Ottoman sultan. Shortly after the ship left Yokohama Port to return home, it encountered a storm and sank off Wakayama Prefecture on Sept. 16. More than 500 sailors were killed, while 69 were rescued by local residents. Over eight days of underwater searching from late January to mid-February, the team collected about 300 items, including coins used in Japan at the time of the sinking and a nail more than 30 centimeters long. The square metal plate we saw may have been a decoration on the lid of a box buried under the seafloor. The aim of the research was to find remnants that provide a sense of the lives of the sailors on the Ertugrul, rather than to analyze the cause of the wreck. Discovered items included a cooking pot 75 centimeters in diameter and a glass perfume bottle. If there actually is a box under the lid on the seafloor, the researchers think it may contain letters and other documents.
http://the-japan-news.com/
PREHISTOIRE – 
- A team of researchers working at Harvard University has taken yet another step towards bringing to life a reasonable facsimile of a woolly mammoth—a large, hairy elephant-like beast that went extinct approximately 3,300 years ago. The work by the team has not been published as yet, because as team lead George Church told The Sunday Times, recently, they believe they have more work to do before they write up their results. Church is quick to point out that his team is not cloning the mammoth, instead they are rebuilding the genome of the ancient animal by studying its DNA, replicating it and then inserting the copy into the genome of an Asian elephant—the closest modern day equivalent. They are not bringing forth a new mammoth yet either—all of their work is confined to simple cells in their lab. What they have done, however, is build healthy living elephant cells with mammoth DNA in them. Their work is yet another step towards that ultimate goal, realizing the birth of a wooly mammoth that is as faithful to the original as is humanly possible. Talk of cloning a mammoth began not long after scientists learned how to actually do cloning—mammoth carcasses have been found in very cold places which preserved remains, which of course, included DNA. But not everyone has been onboard with the idea—some claim it is stepping into God's territory, others suggest it seems ridiculous considering all of the species that are nearing extinction, including those of elephants. Why not use those financial resources that are now going towards bringing back something that has gone extinct, to saving those that are still here? The technique the team is using is called Crispr, it allows for reproducing exact copies of genes—in this case 14 mammoth genes, which are then inserted into elephant genes. As Church explains, the team prioritizes which genes are replicated and inserted, based on such factors as hairiness, ear size, and subcutaneous fat, which the animal needed to survive in its harsh cold environment.
