Archaeologists have discovered an unusual artifact they say could represent the earliest known use of written numbers ever discovered in Mesoamerica.

The curious clay figurine features eleven small dots carved into its surface, appearing in three columns. Although its exact purpose remains unclear, researchers who report the discovery in Latin American Antiquity believe it could be one of the oldest examples of graphic notation that may have been used for rudimentary calculation or some similar purpose, dating to as far back as around 750 B.C.

Significantly, the researchers behind the recent study argue that this earliest known evidence of numerical writing could offer clues to “the relationship between numeration, bodies, and identity in ancient Mesoamerican worldviews.”

The Enigma of the Tab Figurines

The figurine, roughly the size and shape of a small television remote, was unearthed at an ancient Mesoamerican site located along Guatemala’s Pacific coast, known as La Blanca. It is among a group of similar artifacts archaeologists call tab figurines, and hundreds of these mysterious relics are known from past discoveries at the site.

Named for their unusual slab-like appearance, these figurines also bear anthropomorphic qualities, which include depictions of jewelry and other ornamentation, although the tab figurines do not directly resemble human heads beyond the presence of such ornaments.

A Remarkable Discovery at Ancient La Blanca

While similar past discoveries recognized as tab figurines have been made at La Blanca, the presence of dots appearing in columns makes this one very unique and presents a novel possibility: that the impressions on the statuette may not have been purely decorative.

“The ordered dots on the La Blanca tab figurine’s headdress, of course, raise more questions than they answer,” write authors Julia Guernsey, Stephanie M. Strauss, and Michael Love in their recent study. “This is often the case with unique examples such as this, which cannot be better contextualized within a larger grouping of like objects from La Blanca or elsewhere.”

“Although one might be inclined to dismiss the La Blanca figurine as a curiosity or an isolated addendum to the complicated history of first writing in Mesoamerica,” the authors go on to note, “we believe that it merits this thorough discussion.”

Clues to Unraveling a Mesoamerican Mystery

A clue to the artifact’s purpose may arise from the association between tab figurines and the human head, a region of the body that is traditionally associated with individual identity. This is significant, since archaeologists recognize a potential link between numbers and individual identity in the world of ancient Mesoamerica.

Based on existing archaeological knowledge from the region, it is known that experimentation with numbers had already begun around the time the artifact is believed to have been made. One well-characterized numerical system is known as the dot-and-bar system, which, as the name implies, relies on dots and bars to convey figures of one and five units, respectively.

“In the Mixtec and Aztec codices, one easily becomes accustomed to reading even long strings of single dots and quickly approximating their quantity, a visuo-summation process known as subitizing,” the authors write.

“And no matter what form Mesoamerican numerals took, the vigesimal system was rooted in metaphors/mnemonics of the body: specifically, 10 fingers and 10 toes and concepts of personhood anchored to the number 20,” they add.

Also of significance is the K’iche’ word for person, winik, which is the same word used for the number 20, and for a simple reason: it refers to the ten fingers and ten toes of the human body.

Connections to Mesoamerican Personhood Concepts

Although the connections between the unique figurine unearthed at La Blanca and existing knowledge of Mesoamerican number systems are compelling, the researchers caution against interpreting the artifact solely through the lens of later Mesoamerican writing systems. One main reason why is that scholars think there probably wasn’t ever any single method for recording numbers across the region.

Still, the artifact nonetheless joins a growing body of evidence that could point to the fact that the inhabitants of La Blanca were experimenting with symbolic communication, and at a time centuries before fully developed writing systems emerged in the region.

While the exact meaning of the dots on the statuette remains unknown, the researchers behind the study make a compelling case for why the markings may have represented a name, a date, or another personal identifier. If correct, the placement of the dots may hint at an early connection between numeration, identity, and social expression during a period when some of Mesoamerica’s first urban communities were taking shape.

“Yet a question remains as to whether the identity expressed by the La Blanca tab figurine with its 11 dots was human, supernatural, or a combination thereof,” the authors concede, although concluding that their assessment of the artifact strongly points to the known associations between time, numbers, and the concept of personhood as envisioned in the minds of ancient Mesoamericans.

“Early Mesoamerican conceptualizations of time and the nature of being, perhaps, were not so very different from those of Aristotle for whom Paul Ricoeur noted, ‘Being in time [meant] more than existing when time exists. It [meant] ‘being in number.’”

The study, “Numbers and Bodies: Potential Early Numeration on a Middle Preclassic Figurine from La Blanca, Guatemala,” was published in Latin American Antiquity.

Micah Hanks is the Editor-in-Chief and Co-Founder of The Debrief. A longtime reporter on science, defense, and technology with a focus on space and astronomy, he can be reached at micah@thedebrief.org. Follow him on X @MicahHanks, and at micahhanks.com.

Thousands of years ago, Scotland’s early inhabitants were building mysterious artificial islands in lakes throughout the region—and now archaeologists have uncovered evidence that reveals these curious aquatic features to be far older than once thought.

Scattered throughout Scotland’s ancient lochs, these curious structures—known as crannogs—have long intrigued archaeologists and historians, partially due to the questions about their age.

Now, artifacts recovered from these human-built islands are pushing back the timescales on their construction, causing researchers to have to reconsider the origins of one of the most enigmatic lacustrine features in the British Isles.

The Crannog Enigma

Crannogs have been known to archaeologists for some time, with some of the earliest extensive explorations of these features undertaken beginning more than a century ago by Odo Blundell, a monk at Fort Augustus Abbey.

Constructed mostly from stone and timber, speculations about their creation extend to as early as the Bronze Age, although most scholars believe these curious features were likely to have been an invention of the Iron Age.

However, a surprising recent discovery is now challenging that presumption, revealing that some of these artificial islands date back to more than 5,000 years ago, having been built during Scotland’s Neolithic era.

Older Than Previously Thought

The story began to unfold in 2012 when local diver Chris Murray was exploring a crannog near the Isle of Lewis in Scotland’s Outer Hebrides. There, he discovered fragments of ancient pottery that experts at the National Museum of Scotland later examined, revealing an astonishing discovery: the remains of artifacts unequivocally associated with the Neolithic period.

The implication was obvious: for Neolithic pottery to have been found on this crannog would indicate it must have been constructed thousands of years earlier than the past dating of these artificial islands.

The discovery prompted a deeper look at the region’s ancient artificial islands, which soon revealed additional evidence of their Neolithic provenance. During the research, Stephanie Blankshein, a maritime archaeologist at the University of Southampton, and colleagues discovered that organic materials and artifacts from several sites across Scotland’s Outer Hebrides indicated these crannogs were likely built sometime between 4,000 and 2,500 BCE.

At least 11 crannogs in the region, Blankshein and her colleagues say, were created during the Neolithic period, pushing back the date of their construction to as far back as six thousand years ago.

Rethinking the Lives of the Ancient Scots

One of the most intriguing aspects of the team’s findings involves what it reveals about the ingenuity of the early farming communities in the British Isles, since the new dating of these prehistoric artificial islands indicates that they must have been constructed within just a few centuries of when their ancient builders arrived in the region.

Such findings align well with past genetic studies, which indicate that the region’s Neolithic populations likely descended from farmers who made their way from the Near East through Europe, and eventually settled in the British Isles, where they made their new homes by the sea.

It remains unclear, however, whether the construction of crannogs had been an innovation that occurred after they arrived in Britain, or if this had been a much earlier practice these people brought with them.

Discoveries at the Loch Bhorgastail Crannog

Among the most remarkable crannog sites is one found at Loch Bhorgastail on the Isle of Lewis. This artificial island was initially believed to have been primarily built from stone, with some evidence of timber used as reinforcement.

However, underwater excavations by Blankshein and her colleagues soon uncovered something very surprising hidden below the crannog: a massive timber platform supporting the entire structure.

“As excavation advanced, it quickly became apparent that the terrestrial and underwater components formed a single continuous structure spanning both environments and could not be treated separately,” Blankshein and her colleagues write in a recent study detailing their research at the site.

During their underwater surveys, the team discovered that the wooden foundation extended beneath the entire island and dated to between 3500 and 3300 BCE. Measuring approximately 75 feet (23 meters) across, the platform may have originally sat in shallow water or even remained dry during parts of the year.

“Loch Bhorgastail provided a rare opportunity to develop, test, and refine a workflow capable of achieving terrestrial-grade accuracy underwater,” the research team writes. “The site demonstrates the potential of shallow-water archaeology to bridge the land–water interface while elevating the precision and reliability of underwater recording.”

Lingering Questions

A fundamental question that remains about these curious Neolithic constructions has to do with what their purpose was.

One clue may arrive in the form of residues found on the recent pottery discoveries at several of these sites, which indicate they were used to transport food. This may suggest the crannogs were locations where ancient people prepared and consumed meals, possibly during ceremonial gatherings.

However, it is also possible that these ancient structures served multiple purposes, ranging from sites for communal feasting to possible locations for meetings.

Despite the lingering questions about their use by Scotland’s ancient inhabitants, Blankshein and her colleagues saw these marvelous Neolithic structures as an ideal target for high-resolution shallow-water photogrammetry, which became the focus of her team’s recent research.

“Coastal, riverine, and lacustrine environments have played a central role in the development of human societies, yet locating and documenting this record of activity in littoral environments has proven difficult,” the team writes.

As a result of their research, the team’s findings, combined with recent archaeological discoveries from over the last decade or more, help to shed new light on Britain’s ancient past, while advancing the development of new archaeological approaches. This includes groundbreaking methods for creating 3D models of shallow underwater sites, which the team achieved by using paired action cameras.

As investigations continue, Blankshein and her colleagues suspect many more Neolithic crannogs remain hidden beneath the waters of Scotland and Ireland, and with their discovery and investigation, the potential for further advancements in understanding Europe’s earliest farming societies.

The team’s recent paper, “At the Water’s Edge: Photogrammetry in Extreme Shallow-Water Environments,” appeared in Advances in Archaeological Science.

Micah Hanks is the Editor-in-Chief and Co-Founder of The Debrief. A longtime reporter on science, defense, and technology with a focus on space and astronomy, he can be reached at micah@thedebrief.org. Follow him on X @MicahHanks, and at micahhanks.com.

Nearly three out of every four images obtained by NASA’s new SPHEREx space telescope revealed something many astronomers were afraid of: contamination by artificial objects humans are launching into space.

The findings were reported in a new preprint paper by researchers at NASA’s Ames Research Center, who say that 73.3% of all the images the telescope captured over four months last summer revealed evidence of at least one trail left by SpaceX satellites or other orbital spacecraft.

What may be worst of all is that astronomers aren’t surprised.

With its mission to map the night sky in near-infrared light, NSA’s Spectro-Photometer for the History of the Universe, Epoch of Reionization, and Ices Explorer (SPHEREx) relies on long-exposure imagery that enables it to map large regions of the sky with every viewing.

Unfortunately, long-exposure photography is also ideal for capturing the movement of satellites, an increasing number of which have been placed in orbit in recent years.

Equally troubling is the fact that SPHEREx, from its own position in Earth orbit, had been positioned at an altitude where it was hoped that the number of satellite streaks could be limited. Yet despite such efforts, the new paper featured at the arXiv preprint server reports that, on average, at least two satellite trails were detected in every exposure.

Satellites Mistaken for Cosmic Rays

Astronomers have been raising concerns about this problem already for some time, and presently, there doesn’t appear to be any near-term solution.

Even beyond image contamination, the preprint study also found that several satellites that enter SPHEREx’s field of view are bright enough that they are also triggering the space telescope’s automated system that protects its delicate components from stray cosmic rays.

Designed to shut down the telescope’s data collection when it detects what it suspects are cosmic rays, the new research reveals that some satellites reflect enough light to engage algorithms that control this defense system.

Even in instances where imagery is successfully obtained, albeit with contamination from satellites, the brightness of these orbital objects can effectively obscure objects behind the portions of the telescope’s images where the satellites appeared.

A Growing Concern

The new SphereX findings are only the latest indication that astronomers were right to be concerned about potential light pollution from satellites. In a past study by Sando Kruk and colleagues, Hubble Telescope images had shown an increase in the number of satellites crossing its field of view, rising from contamination shown in just 2.8% of its images, to 5.9% over a period of two decades.

Ideas about how to prevent the issue have focused on using anti-reflective coatings on satellites and other means of reducing their brightness once they reach orbit. However, many modern satellites are large enough that having darker exteriors doesn’t help to significantly mitigate the amount of light they can reflect.

Additionally, the study’s authors note that “Optical reflections are just a fraction of the problem, since satellites also emit and reflect [infrared],” meaning that optical darkening efforts “might even increase their temperature, making them brighter in the IR.”

Worse Before It Gets Better

According to the study’s authors, the problem is likely to worsen before astronomers see any improvements.

“Remarkably, some private operators have announced the intent of deploying 4000 purposely high reflective satellites,” the researchers write, which aim to provide “sunlight on demand.” Such artificial orbital systems, if successfully deployed, would reflect light as much as five times the brightness of the full Moon onto areas of the Earth roughly five kilometers in diameter.

This, the team argues, would potentially have “a catastrophic impact to the quality of the dark sky and the Earth’s inhabitants.”

Fundamentally, the authors hope that bringing additional attention to such issues with their recent study may help to mitigate future concerns about our ever-brightening night sky.

“The widespread contamination addressed in this paper affects multiple areas of astronomical research,” the team says, which they say includes “the study of transient phenomena, deep imaging surveys, spectroscopic studies, and the search for Near-Earth Objects (NEOs), thereby hindering our ability to understand the Universe and protect the Earth.”

The new paper by Alejandro S. Borlaff and colleagues, “SPHEREx confirms predictions for artificial satellite trail pollution in Low Earth Orbit,” appeared at the preprint arXiv server.

Micah Hanks is the Editor-in-Chief and Co-Founder of The Debrief. A longtime reporter on science, defense, and technology with a focus on space and astronomy, he can be reached at micah@thedebrief.org. Follow him on X @MicahHanks, and at micahhanks.com.

A shelter-in-place order issued at the Pentagon on Thursday has now been lifted, officials have confirmed, following what was characterized as a “hazardous materials incident”.

Earlier on Thursday, firefighters arrived at the building, which serves as the headquarters of the United States Department of War, in response to concerns involving air quality at the facility.

“Earlier this morning, Pentagon occupants were notified of a potential air quality issue, prompting immediate precautionary safety measures and evaluation,” said Pentagon spokesman Sean Parnell in a posting on X.

“Subsequent testing confirmed no hazard exists, and normal operations have resumed,” Parnell said. “We express our sincere appreciation to the first responders for their swift actions to ensure the safety of all personnel.”

In an earlier post, Parnell said that the Pentagon houses “sophisticated systems to ensure the safety of the building and its occupants,” which had reportedly detected “an air quality issue necessitating precautionary measures until we determine its significance.”

In response to the unspecified air quality issue, the Department of War observed what Parnell characterized as “standard protection protocols, including a shelter-in-place order for the affected area.”

“Response teams are in place and ready to support building occupants,” the early statement read.

Separate postings on social media from Arlington County Fire and Rescue indicated that its personnel were on the scene supporting hazmat teams while the incident was under investigation.

Presently, it remains unclear what the issue was that prompted the concerns at the Pentagon, where close to 30,000 U.S. military and civilian personnel are employed.

This is a developing story, which may be updated as new information is made available.

Micah Hanks is the Editor-in-Chief and Co-Founder of The Debrief. A longtime reporter on science, defense, and technology with a focus on space and astronomy, he can be reached at micah@thedebrief.org. Follow him on X @MicahHanks, and at micahhanks.com.

Welcome to this edition of The Intelligence Brief… This week, the ongoing conflict between the United States and Iran appears to be edging closer to a broader regional crisis, as both nations exchange new rounds of military strikes amid fading hopes for diplomacy. In our analysis, we’ll be looking at 1) the latest U.S. and Iranian attacks near the Strait of Hormuz and across the Gulf region, 2) President Trump’s escalating rhetoric and warnings of additional military action targeting Iran’s oil infrastructure, 3) the growing humanitarian and economic consequences of the conflict, including disruptions to shipping and concerns over civilian infrastructure, and 4) why analysts increasingly fear that continued escalation could draw the region closer to a wider war with global repercussions.

Quote of the Week

“The strikes are in response to Iran’s unwarranted and continued aggression. U.S. forces remain vigilant, lethal, and ready.”

– U.S. Central Command, June 10, 2026

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Ongoing U.S. Conflict with Iran Could Signal a Broader War

This week, a clear end to the ongoing U.S. conflict with Iran still seems remote, as the United States and Iran engaged in another round of military strikes.

Early this morning, strikes exchanged between the nations’ military forces signaled the potential that a dangerous new phase of the conflict may be approaching, after an initial several months of efforts aiming to avoid escalation to a broader regional war.

Among the most recent attacks, several locations near the Strait of Hormuz were targeted, as ongoing warnings by President Trump urged Iranian officials to heed U.S. warnings and bring the conflict to an end.

Latest Attacks in the U.S.-Iran War

In response to the attacks, Iran also launched several strikes on targets linked to U.S. assets that include military facilities in Kuwait and Bahrain. The Iranian strikes prompted air-defense activity throughout the region, along with airspace restrictions that have been temporarily elevated in the Gulf.

Amid the strikes, Iranian officials claimed that all maritime traffic had been closed off from passage through the Strait of Hormuz. However, U.S. officials disputed the claims on Thursday.

The renewed violence follows several strikes confirmed by U.S. Central Command late on Wednesday.

“CENTCOM forces launched strikes on Iranian military surveillance capabilities, communication systems, and air defense sites across Iran. U.S. Marine Corps, Air Force, and Navy assets fired precision munitions on Iranian targets that posed a threat to U.S. forces and international commercial ships transiting regional waters,” read a posting on the official U.S. Central Command X account.

Trump: U.S. Will “Assume Total Control”

Early on Thursday, President Trump also warned about further military action by the United States against Iran.

“The United States will be hitting Iran (Whose Navy, Air Force, Radar, Anti Aircraft, and all other forms of Defense, together with most of its offensive capability, are GONE!), VERY HARD TONIGHT,” President Trump wrote in one of his characteristically bombastic social media postings on Thursday.

Trump also claimed that in “the not too distant future” the U.S. would be capturing Kharg Island, along with other locations that play a key role in the oil infrastructure of the region, with the broader plan to “assume total control of their Oil and Gas Markets, much like we have with Venezuela, which is working out brilliantly for both Venezuela and the United States of America.”

Beyond the typical hyperbolic phrasing, the President’s post on Thursday appeared to indicate locations that could become future targets, although similar ongoing threats have repeatedly been made by Mr. Trump in recent weeks, in an effort to encourage Iranian officials to agree to U.S. demands that aim to curb the country’s nuclear ambitions—a significant goalpost the U.S. has maintained in efforts to end the war.

As Escalations Continue, Broader Problems Emerge

Efforts to bring about a cease-fire agreement have been in the works since April, although Iran’s foreign ministry now says such efforts have been rendered “meaningless” by the continued American strikes.

Firing back, U.S. officials, including Secretary of War Pete Hegseth, have characterized the attacks as being “part of an effort to pressure Tehran into accepting negotiations over its nuclear program” amid broader security concerns the U.S. is attempting to reconcile.

However, more broadly, the conflict is also having a far wider economic and humanitarian impact. Recent U.S. military operations that have targeted vessels suspected of transporting Iranian oil have reportedly struck multiple commercial ships in recent days, with India confirming that three of its citizens were killed aboard one tanker.

“CENTCOM forces have disabled nine non-compliant vessels, redirected 135 ships that complied, and allowed 42 vessels supporting humanitarian aid to pass since initiating the blockade on April 13,” U.S. Central Command wrote in an update on Thursday.

“The blockade is being enforced impartially against vessels of all nations entering or departing Iranian ports and coastal areas, including all Iranian ports on the Arabian Gulf and Gulf of Oman,” the posting added.

Humanitarian and Economic Concerns 

Based on satellite imagery reviewed by analysts, the potential that some of the recent strikes may have damaged drinking-water infrastructure in southern Iran has also been raised, increasing humanitarian concerns.

Financial markets are also reacting to the growing instability. The European Central Bank cited war-related inflation pressures as it raised interest rates, while the World Bank warned that rising energy costs linked to the conflict are slowing global economic growth to its weakest pace since the COVID-19 pandemic.

Overall, as the ongoing military operations by both nations continue, and with few signs of diplomacy on the immediate horizon, concerns continue to mount over whether a broader regional crisis—one the U.S. has hoped to avoid—could now loom nearer than at any time before.

That concludes this week’s installment of The Intelligence Brief. You can read past editions of our newsletter at our website, or if you found this installment online, don’t forget to subscribe and get future email editions from us here. Also, if you have a tip or other information you’d like to send along directly to me, you can email me at micah [@] thedebrief [dot] org, or reach me on X: @MicahHanks.

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California could be due for a major earthquake in the near future, according to concerning new models based on data comprising 1,000 years of quake activity on the West Coast.

According to recent findings, tectonic stress has quietly been building in California to levels not seen since the last major earthquake in the region, which bore a magnitude of 7.9 and struck the West Coast nearly 170 years ago.

That event, known as the Fort Tejon earthquake, affected the greater Los Angeles area, and since the time of those historic rumblings, researchers have grown increasingly concerned about a period of seismic silence that could point to the likelihood of an event of similar magnitude at some point in the future.

The potentially concerning new forecast was detailed in a recent study by an international team of researchers led by Dr. Liliane Burkhard of the Division of Space Research and Planetary Sciences (WP) at the Physics Institute of the University of Bern, which focused on historic earthquake data as a means of gauging current stress loading at Cajon Pass.

The study, published in the Journal of Geophysical Research: Solid Earth, indicates tectonic stress levels that are now believed to exceed the highest seen during the years the team surveyed.

The “Earthquake Gate” at Cajon Pass

The researchers aimed to investigate stress that has slowly built along the San Andreas and San Jacinto faults and incorporated what they likened to an “earthquake gate” at Cajon Pass, which, in their models, functioned like a point of control that governed the size of earthquakes and whether they could spread to both systems.

For their research, they used a four-dimensional earthquake cycle model that allowed them to replicate certain processes both in spatial dimensions and across time.

Using a millennium of reconstructed earthquake data from the region based on geological information such as radiocarbon dates, unusual events recorded in dendrochronological data (i.e., information obtained from tree rings), and historical information sources, the team gave this to the model they devised.

Dr. Burkhard said the team’s simulation offered them a unique opportunity to better understand the ways stresses in the fault system build up over long periods of several centuries.

“By running the earthquake history of Southern California as a simulation, we can estimate the extent to which the fault system is already under stress today,” Dr. Burkhard said. The results of those simulations weren’t particularly promising either: according to Burkhard, current stress levels in the region are the highest they have been in 1,000 years, based on the data.

Concerning New Earthquake Data

The team also identified significant new information regarding the function of the so-called “earthquake gate” at Cajon Pass.

“The earthquake gate concept captures something important about how fault junctions work,” Burkhard said in a recent statement. “Cajon Pass doesn’t simply block or channel earthquakes: It responds to stress conditions, and those conditions change over centuries.”

Not only this, but Burkhard and her team also determined that a key element to these quakes involves not only the level of stress that accumulates at a single fault, but perhaps more significantly, the way stress between two systems can align. This is because, as the stress across a pair of faults rises together over longer periods, this appears to be most conducive to a large joint rupture comparable to the 1857 Fort Tejon earthquake.

Conversely, if stress levels are not in concert as they evolve, the team determined that this causes quakes that probably will not propagate beyond the junction.

In short, a more severe earthquake event today would entail a joint rupture that crosses the Cajon Pass, as opposed to one constrained either to the San Andreas or the San Jacinto Fault alone. Should such an event occur, it would likely impact one of the largest population centers, as well as a crucial infrastructure system that supplies energy and transportation to surrounding areas.

For Burkhard, “The question of when and how the next major earthquake will occur in this region is one of the most pressing problems in applied geoscience.” Based on the team’s findings, they say that their new modeling hopes to provide a much more complete picture of the science behind the factors that could lead to a major quake—conditions that could apply equally to other parts of the world as they do to California.

Burkhard adds that her team’s study is not intended merely as a prediction for when the next major earthquake could potentially occur, but also as a means of preparing for future quakes and mitigating their effects.

“What we can say is that the system is critically stressed and that physics-based models like ours give a clearer picture of the range of scenarios we should be prepared for,” Burkhard says. “This information is important for hazard assessment, infrastructure planning, and emergency preparedness.”

The team’s study, “Cajon Pass and the Southern San Andreas Fault System: Earthquake Cycle Stress Accumulation and Present‐Day Loading,” appeared in the Journal of Geophysical Research: Solid Earth.

Micah Hanks is the Editor-in-Chief and Co-Founder of The Debrief. A longtime reporter on science, defense, and technology with a focus on space and astronomy, he can be reached at micah@thedebrief.org. Follow him on X @MicahHanks, and at micahhanks.com.

A curious recent discovery has revealed a promising new underground archaeological find at the ancient site of Buto in Egypt’s Nile Delta.

Researchers who were testing a remote sensing technology designed to locate buried structures and other below-ground features reported the unique find earlier this year, which could be a previously undiscovered tomb or temple now believed to date as far back as 2,600 years.

The discovery was made at the Tell el-Fara’in site, more commonly known as Buto, which comprises the remains of an ancient city that thrived around 5,600 years ago during Egypt’s Predynastic period.

Origins of a Mystery

Buto underwent several periods of destruction and reassembly throughout its history, making it a significant focus of past archaeological work.

Some of the city’s oldest portions are currently entombed beneath several centuries’ worth of accumulated mud and soil, a factor that significantly complicates traditional excavations. To help them locate an ideal location for future excavation, the team employed an approach that combined SAR (Sentinel-1 GRD) satellite imagery with electrical resistivity tomography (ERT) measurements, which helped them pinpoint an ideal location to dig that would best enable an investigation of Buto’s settlement phases.

“Sentinel-1 (C-band) satellite imagery captured on May 5, 2018, was processed using SNAP software (version 9.0.0) to identify large-scale anomalies indicative of buried structures,” the team reports in a paper detailing their findings, which appeared in Applied Geophysics in March.

“Based on these detected anomalies, the locations for ERT profiles were strategically selected to maximize the likelihood of indicating significant subsurface features,” the team explained.

ERT technology is ideal for such carefully targeted excavation, since it relies on electrical currents placed into the ground, which researchers then use to collect data that helps them assemble a three-dimensional model of the buried structures. This imagery is generated based on differences in the way various materials either display electrical conductivity or resistance.

Buried Discoveries Emerge

Based on the team’s scans, the top three meters of the area revealed a distinctive layer of material, which the team judged to be broken pottery and debris—likely associated with Roman periods of occupation.

However, going further down in their scans, descending to a depth of approximately six meters, the team discovered something more intriguing: what appeared to be some kind of large buried structure.

Based on its depth, the team believes this unique structure is likely associated with the Saite period, which dates it to around 2,600 years ago. Although it remains unknown precisely what the structure is, or what its exact purpose may have been, one possibility is that it could be a large shrine, or even a tomb.

Uncovering Religious Artifacts

Following the initial discovery, the team undertook preliminary excavations of a small 10 x 10-meter area. This revealed walls constructed of mudbrick, as well as religious artifacts in locations that aligned with the team’s scans.

“The presence of a small offering basin along with numerous religious amulets depicting Egyptian deities such as Isis, Horus, Taweret, and Wadjet further supports the temple hypothesis,” the team writes in their study.

Also among the religious artifacts uncovered at the site were a “remarkable bronze amulet with a suspension hole, representing Horus the child” as well as amulets featuring a crouching lion, an amulet of Anubis, and the remains of limestone statues “in sexual positions” along with “a faience plaque with relief carvings of Hathor on both sides.”

However, the team reports that one of the most significant artifacts recovered from this area of the excavation was a steatite scarab bearing the name of King Thutmose III, which the team believes “may have functioned as an amulet or seal.”

“Collectively, these artefacts indicate the presence of a religious site with strong cultic and ceremonial associations, further reinforcing the interpretation of the structure as a temple from the 26th Dynasty,” the team says.

Ongoing Excavations

While still in the early phases, the team’s discoveries so far help to validate the geophysical and remote sensing techniques that made the discovery possible. “The results of this study demonstrate the effectiveness of combining geophysical measurements and remote sensing data,” the team writes, adding that they provided “a very accurate vision in detecting buried settlements in a complex region.”

“3D inversion algorithms were particularly effective in delineating buried mudbrick walls and architectural structures, significantly enhancing our understanding of site formation processes,” the researchers add.

Going forward, the team recommends further ERT surveys, which may help to reveal additional information about the site’s deepest occupation levels. For the time being, the team believes the evidence in hand points to the interpretation of the site and its features as an ancient temple, and that evidence points to the possibility that another may be located nearby.

“Our findings suggest that, in addition to the known temple, another temple may remain buried under a thick clay layer, which will be investigated through extensive measurements in forthcoming studies,” the team writes.

The recent paper, “Multi-scale detection of buried archaeological elements across different occupation phases: an integrated approach using radar satellite imagery and electric resistivity tomography at Buto, northwestern Nile Delta of Egypt,” appeared in Applied Geophysics on March 10, 2026.

Micah Hanks is the Editor-in-Chief and Co-Founder of The Debrief. A longtime reporter on science, defense, and technology with a focus on space and astronomy, he can be reached at micah@thedebrief.org. Follow him on X @MicahHanks, and at micahhanks.com.

NASA officials have completed an investigation into an incident that caused damage to a 70-meter radio frequency antenna last year.

The incident, which occurred at the Goldstone Deep Space Communications Complex near Barstow, California, affected the space agency’s Deep Space Station 14 (DSS-14), a 70-meter radio-frequency antenna, which currently remains offline awaiting repairs and system upgrades.

Joel Montalbano, acting associate administrator for NASA’s Space Operations Mission Directorate, emphasized that the agency “takes safety and any departure from established procedures seriously,” adding that investigations into the incident at Goldstone “made clear that we must strengthen our processes. We are acting on the investigation’s findings.”

Incident at Goldstone

The damage was caused last September 16, 2025, when the antenna reportedly over-extended during rotation during tracking for NASA’s Juno mission. Stress on the antenna’s cabling and support infrastructure, as well as damage to its fire-suppression system, is expected to cost between $4.1 and $4.6 million in repairs.

Fortunately, no injuries were reported at the time of the incident, and a Mishap Investigation Board was convened to investigate the underlying causes. Following on-site inspections, interviews, and reviews of technical documentation from NASA’s three Deep Space Network facilities, the results of the investigation were included in a report submitted in April, which also made recommendations on how to prevent future incidents.

Software Issues

A primary factor behind the incident had been what the reports’ authors characterize as “software weaknesses, human error, and an undetected failure in the antenna’s hydraulic limit system,” according to a recent NASA statement.

“Investigators determined an electrical issue at the antenna the previous day caused the control system to misreport the antenna’s rotation state, an issue that went unnoticed and triggered multiple limit-stops during the Juno track,” the statement added.

Over-rotation of the antenna resulted after flooding in the antenna base was spotted by operators, following troubleshooting efforts that accidentally bypassed safeguards in the system’s hardware and software.

Investigators also determined that the antenna’s hydraulic limit system had already been rendered inoperable before the September 16 incident, following damage sustained “in an undocumented prior incident.”

Modernization for Future Missions

On June 5, Montalbano emphasized that NASA plans to follow the guidance in the review board’s report, with a focus on ensuring greater adherence to procedures to help limit the likelihood of future mishaps.

“We will update and improve procedures, rebuild core in-house capabilities, and reinforce operational discipline across the Deep Space Network,” Montalbano said.

“NASA remains focused on learning from this and modernizing systems, so DSS-14 and the broader network are ready to support our ambitious future missions,” he added.

Micah Hanks is the Editor-in-Chief and Co-Founder of The Debrief. A longtime reporter on science, defense, and technology with a focus on space and astronomy, he can be reached at micah@thedebrief.org. Follow him on X @MicahHanks, and at micahhanks.com.

In 1925, while exploring the remote jungles of the Amazon on a quest to uncover a fabled lost city, British explorer Percy Fawcett and his small expedition party vanished without a trace.

Fawcett, a noted geographer, artillery officer, cartographer, surveyor, and archaeologist, set off into the rainforest accompanied only by his son, Jack Fawcett, and Jack’s best friend, Raleigh Rimell. Their goal was to locate an ancient lost city rumored to exist in the heart of the Amazon that Fawcett and others called “The Lost City of Z.”

While Fawcett and his expedition crew’s fate remains unknown, new advancements in modern archaeological science, propelled by technologies that include unmanned aerial vehicles and LiDAR, are now revealing what could be the archaeological reality behind part of what the ill-fated British explorer sought.

“The reward is that we’re finally finding the ‘lost civilisation’ that explorers like Percy Fawcett were searching for a century ago,” says José Iriarte, a professor of archaeology at the University of Exeter, writing in a piece featured at The Conversation, though adding that such discoveries are now being made “by cajoling a drone rather than battering through jungle.”

LiDAR: Unearthing Lost Worlds Hidden from Time

For a time, archaeologists presumed that the Amazon rainforest was a vast wilderness that, while abundant in resources, would have been capable of supporting only small, scattered communities.

With the aid of modern technologies, those past ideas have gradually changed as new archaeological evidence continues to push researchers toward rethinking past assumptions. Among these technologies is advanced laser-mapping technology known as LiDAR (light detection and ranging), which archaeologists have put to great use in the last several decades to aid in uncovering evidence of surface features that were once either inaccessible or otherwise invisible during ground-based surveys.

Something else that LiDAR excels at is penetrating the dense forest of areas like the Amazon, enabling researchers to get unprecedented aerial views of the surface below the canopy, along with any structures that may have been left there by humans from long ago. The result has been evidence of sprawling ancient societies hidden beneath the cover of thick jungle, revealing the Amazon as a region that once supported large populations that existed in sophisticated, interconnected landscapes.

Rediscovering a ‘Lost Civilization’ in the Amazon

A particularly striking example of such discoveries involves the Llanos de Moxos region of northern Bolivia, where recent LiDAR surveys have revealed the presence of a sprawling archaeological site long hidden by dense jungle. Archaeologists believe the ancient settlement is linked to what is called the Casarabe culture, which would have thrived in the area sometime between A.D. 500 and 1400.

“The Casarabe organized into a hierarchy of four different sizes of settlements,” writes Professor Iriarte in his recent piece at The Conversation. “The biggest ones—the primary settlements—were as large as 3km² or 300 hectares.”

“That’s enough space for over 400 football pitches,” Iriarte notes, “suggesting that they could have accommodated substantial numbers of people.”

Unseen Evidence of an Ancient Amazonian Culture

Viewed from the ground, an observer who braved this dense region of Bolivian jungle might only see thick patches of forest separated by grassland savannahs.

That all changes when viewing LiDAR imagery obtained during aerial surveys, however. Through the sensitive detection capabilities afforded by laser pulses that can easily penetrate the dense vegetation, a lost world emerges—one the likes of which Percy Fawcett and other early explorers once only dreamed of rediscovering.

Researchers have now successfully identified a vast network of settlements at Llanos de Moxos, connected by raised causeways, canals, reservoirs, and engineered agricultural systems that cover an area of close to 20,000 square kilometers.

These complexes upend past thinking about the presence of isolated settlements in the region, and instead appear to show sites covering areas as large as three square kilometers, featuring monumental civic and ceremonial architecture, towering conical pyramids that ascend to heights of 20 meters, and the presence of massive U-shaped structures, which archaeologists believe had likely served as ceremonial structures that once hosted gatherings.

Unprecedented Scale of a Hidden World

Another surprising feature is the scale of the structures archaeologists have uncovered, which they say rivals some of the most well-known monuments like those of the ancient Tiwanaku civilization in the Andes.

Yet, unlike many densely packed ancient cities, the Casarabe landscape also differs in several ways: the unique variety of urbanism it reflects is suggestive of dispersed populations whose connected infrastructure also brought them together through ancient shared water management systems.

“It was clearly all planned and coordinated,” Iriarte explains, adding that the ancient builders at Llanos de Moxos engaged in precocious designs that were intended “not only as living spaces but for integrating the population across the region.” Similar architectural planning has been observed at other ancient sites around the world, which include those assembled by the ancient Maya of Central America, as well as the builders of Angkor across the world in Cambodia.

The “Dark Earth” Enigma

Beyond just architecture and clues to the way of life of these ancient societies, researchers are also gaining new insights into the agricultural practices of the early Amazonian world.

For many decades, scientists presumed that a major limiting factor on the region’s ability to sustain larger populations hinged on the presence of factors that included poor soils, seasonal flooding, droughts, and tropical diseases. However, mounting evidence suggests that the indigenous societies of the region were far from hindered by the landscape, and instead managed to transform and manage farmland at scales previously unimagined.

Along with sophisticated agricultural systems, ancient Amazonians were also capable of engineering remarkably fertile soils, known as Amazonian Dark Earths, which Iriarte says “combined charcoal, bone and waste materials with the existing poor-quality soil to make it fertile enough for widespread farming.”

“Amazonia had reclaimed vast expanses of seasonally flooded savannahs over several thousand years to create raised and drained field systems,” he adds, also noting the construction of extensive drainage networks and the cultivation of diverse crops such as maize. Rather than merely adapting to the rainforest, the ancient inhabitants of the Amazon actively reshaped it.

An Amazonian Archaeological Revolution

Thanks to similar LiDAR surveys that have recently been undertaken in nearby countries, including Ecuador’s Upano Valley, where thousands of structures linked by roads and organized according to highly structured settlement plans have been detected, the recent findings at Llanos de Moxos are one of the latest additions to a broader revolution in archaeology made possible through such exciting Amazonian discoveries.

In addition to Bolivia and Ecuador, researchers have also documented ceremonial earthworks, geometric enclosures, and sprawling ancient settlements in Colombia, Peru, and Brazil in recent years, all of which are challenging decades of past assumptions about ancient life in the Amazon.

Despite the recent advancements in our understanding, many questions remain unanswered. Among the questions archaeologists have are those related to how these ancient societies were governed, as well as what factors led to their decline, a fall which was precipitated by unknown factors that occurred before European arrival.

Possible contributing factors may include shifts in ancient climates, as well as environmental pressures. It is also possible that political changes or conflicts that emerged between neighboring societies may have played a role, which could have contributed to disruptions in trade networks that may have further weakened these once thriving societies.

Despite the remaining mysteries about these enigmatic cultures, one thing is becoming increasingly clear: the Amazon was far from being the unclaimed tropical wilderness many long believed it to be. In many ways, the fascination with lost cities and ancient civilizations that drove explorers like Percy Fawcett—and which led to his untimely fate—had more basis in reality than many historians, archaeologists, and explorers probably guessed.

As ongoing LiDAR surveys continue to expand across previously unexplored regions, archaeologists believe thousands more structures may still await discovery, suggesting that some of the Amazon’s greatest archaeological secrets remain hidden, but no longer kept entirely from view.

“What lies beneath the Amazon is not just a hidden past,” Iriarte says. “It is a reminder that even the most seemingly untouched landscapes can carry deep histories, waiting—sometimes just beneath our feet—to be revealed.”

Professor José Iriarte’s complete article appeared at The Conversation on June 8, 2026.

Micah Hanks is the Editor-in-Chief and Co-Founder of The Debrief. A longtime reporter on science, defense, and technology with a focus on space and astronomy, he can be reached at micah@thedebrief.org. Follow him on X @MicahHanks, and at micahhanks.com.

An iron artifact recovered by archaeologists may be the oldest of its kind ever found in Japan, according to new research.

Recovered during excavations at the Hayashi-Fujishima archaeological site in Fukui, the capital city of Fukui Prefecture, the artifact measures slightly more than an inch and a half across, just under an inch in width, and just a millimeter in thickness.

The presence of tiny, triangular teeth measuring up to 3 millimeters deep indicates the artifact’s use as an early saw, according to investigations by the Fukui Prefectural Archaeological Research Center, which recently announced the discovery.

While similar discoveries have been made in Japan, none are believed to be as old as this saw, which archaeologists have tentatively dated to the late Yayoi Pottery Culture Period, which thrived between the second and third centuries, making it the oldest known in the country.

Tomokatsu Uozu, Deputy Director at the Center, said the age of the discovery indicates the advancement of early iron technologies along the region’s coastal communities during the period.

“The artifact could be an important piece of evidence supporting the advancement of ironware culture along the Sea of Japan coast during the Yayoi period,” Uozu recently told The Asahi Shimbun.

Similar Discoveries in the Ancient East

The saw uncovered at the Hayashi-Fujishima archaeological site bears some similarities to saws from the same period that have been unearthed during past excavations in China.

Such similarities are important, since it is believed that the same iron processing techniques used in the creation of the saw from the Hayashi-Fujishima site originated in China, having been carried across the Korean Peninsula and eventually reaching northern Kyushu, where ancient traders carried it along the Sea of Japan to its eventual arrival at Fukui.

The saw recently showcased by the Fukui Prefectural Archaeological Research Center is only one example of the many artifacts recovered from the Hayashi-Fujishima site.

Identified Decades After Its Discovery

Past work at the site has uncovered additional iron artifacts, as well as stone tools, pottery, distinctive “magatama” and “kudatama” bead varieties, and a range of items during primary excavations, which were conducted during the late 1990s and early 2000s.

The site is believed to also host what remains of an ancient settlement dating to the Yayoi period, a period that was significant for the emergence of organized food production, as well as a unique element associated with the culture: the creation of distinctive, keyhole-shaped burial mounds.

However, it wasn’t until 2021, during restoration work with many of the artifacts retrieved from the site, that researchers first noticed something significant that had gone unnoticed decades earlier at the time of the artifact’s discovery: tiny serrations were present on one of its edges.

Further examination with the help of X-ray CT scan imaging confirmed the artifact’s identity as a triangular or “beak-shaped” saw, similar to other discoveries from later periods. At the time of its use, the complete saw would likely have measured up to five times the length of the remaining fragmentary portion.

Another notable feature of the saw is that the tip of the blade is bent, which archaeologists think may indicate that the saw was used for work involving fine crafting of wooden or stone items.

Breaking Earlier Records for Japan’s Oldest Saw

The discovery now overturns the previous oldest artifact of its kind known from the region, which was uncovered from a third-century burial mound in Hyogo Prefecture. That saw’s association with the Kofun Period, which thrived near the end of the third century, made it the oldest known at the time of its discovery.

Although additional studies are required, the team says that confirmation of the age of the Hayashi-Fujishima site’s saw would extend the timescales once again on the earliest use of such technologies by as much as a century.

Strange green stones, evidence of repeated ancient expeditions, hidden burials, and other discoveries have been made in a remote cave high in the Pyrenees mountains.

The findings were made in a cave located more than 7,300 feet above sea level, revealing evidence that ancient visitors repeatedly endured the hardships of climbing to such altitudes for a period spanning 2,000 years. The question for archaeologists had been why this cave seems to have held such importance.

Now, discoveries at the remote site could potentially alter our understanding of ancient European uses of mountain landscapes in prehistoric times. Of key importance, archaeologists have uncovered ancient hearths that contain small samples of green minerals, which point to ancient mining activities that likely supported ancient metallurgy in the region.

Two Millennia of Human Interest

For more than 2,000 years, ancient Europeans repeatedly traveled to this remote cave, leaving behind evidence of their visits that includes ancient hearths and even a child’s tooth, suggesting the possibility that there may even be hidden graves at the site.

Professor Carlos Tornero, a researcher with the Catalan Institute of Human Paleoecology and Social Evolution, says these discoveries are surprising, since past research suggested such areas would only have been occasionally traversed by humans during periods of migration, rather than becoming destinations.

“For a long time, high-mountain environments were seen as marginal, places prehistoric communities passed through occasionally,” said Tornero, who is the lead author of a new study detailing the findings.

That wasn’t the case with this Cave 338, as archaeologists now call it, which turned out to be a far more unique site.

“We found a really rich archaeological sequence, including multiple combustion structures and a very large number of green mineral fragments,” Tornero recently said. “We can’t say exactly how long people stayed each time, but the repeated use of the space and the density of remains suggest occupations that were short to medium in duration, but happening again and again over long periods of time.”

Evidence of an Ancient Copper Mining Industry

At Cave 338, initial excavations began with a small area spanning six square meters near the cave’s entrance. There, Tornero and the team uncovered evidence of human activity temporally associated with four distinctive layers.

In the most recent layer of human occupation, artifacts from historical periods were found, although in smaller numbers, which suggested that the cave’s use had likely decreased gradually with time. Similar limited use was evidenced in the cave’s deepest layers, where charcoal fragments were discovered with dates indicating human activity as far back as 6,000 years ago.

Within layers two and three, significantly more activity was discernible. Discoveries within these layers included nearly two-dozen hearths, many of which contained burned fragments of a green mineral that researchers believe may be malachite.

If confirmed, this is significant, since malachite is rich in copper and can be processed to extract the metal, meaning that ancient visitors to the cave may have visited the site specifically to mine this unique green mineral. Cave 338 would therefore represent a very high-altitude mining camp, which ancient Europeans somehow discovered and repeatedly visited.

When Fire Heats the Green Stone

Based on radiocarbon dating, hearths located in the site’s second layer are approximately 3,000 years old, while those in the layer directly beneath it date to between 4,000 and 5,000 years ago.

Dr. Julia Montes-Landa of the University of Granada, who was a co-author of the new paper, says that evidence suggests many of the fragments were thermally altered—in other words, they were intentionally exposed to fire—while some of the samples found at the site were not.

This, she argues, “clearly suggests that fire played an important role in their processing and that there was a deliberate intention behind it.”

“They weren’t burned by accident,” Montes-Landa says.

Another indication of ancient industrial activity at the site involves the placement of the hearths in layers two and three, many of which overlap, which strongly suggests reuse. However, more than one area containing overlapping hearths is present, which also suggests that while reuse occurred, it took place in successive periods of visitation throughout time.

Hidden Burials and Prehistoric Artifacts

In addition to ancient evidence of mining and thermal alteration of stone, within the site’s third layer, a small amount of human remains—an ancient baby tooth and a finger bone believed to have belonged to a child—were found.

Such scant remains do not provide context for the cause of death or whether the remains came from the same individual. However, it does point to the possibility of hidden burials that may exist in other portions of the cave.

In addition to human remains, prehistoric artifacts were found at the site, which date to the second millennium BC, including a shell pendant and another made from a bear’s tooth.

“The shell pendant is interesting because it has parallels in other sites in Catalonia, which suggests shared traditions or connections between different communities,” Tornero said. “The bear tooth pendant is much less common.”

“That might point to something more specific or symbolic, possibly linked to the local environment,” Tornero suggests.

Lingering Questions

Obviously, 338 held significance to ancient inhabitants of the region, since, despite the daunting trek reaching it would have required, humans clearly returned there over and over again for a period of at least two thousand years, although evidence of human presence at the location extends to as much as double that amount of time.

Going forward, Tornero, Montes-Landa, and their colleagues hope that future excavations may reveal additional clues about who had been coming here for so long, and what specifically attracted them to the cave.

Of key significance will also be confirmation that the mineral contains copper.

“The identification of the green mineral as malachite is still preliminary,” Tornero says, adding that ongoing research “will provide final answers shortly.”

Much work remains to be done at the site, and Tornero and his team plan to resume excavations there later this year.

“The excavation hasn’t yet reached the full depth of the site,” Tornero said, “so the sequence is not completely documented.”

“This summer we will continue the archaeological work,” Tornero added.

For now, Cave 338 already shows that even some of the most remote areas of the Pyrenees could have played significant roles in the way ancient humans utilized the land and its resources.

“As such, the site provides a key reference framework for understanding high-mountain occupation, resource exploitation and mobility dynamics in the Pyrenees during later prehistory,” the authors write in their recent paper.

The team’s paper, “Beyond 2,000 meters, first evidence of intense prehistoric occupation in the Pyrenees,” appeared in Frontiers in Environmental Archaeology.

Micah Hanks is the Editor-in-Chief and Co-Founder of The Debrief. A longtime reporter on science, defense, and technology with a focus on space and astronomy, he can be reached at micah@thedebrief.org. Follow him on X @MicahHanks, and at micahhanks.com.