Synthetic Aperture Radar Doppler Tomography Reveals Details of Undiscovered High-Resolution Internal Structure of the Great Pyramid of Giza

TL;DR

This paper introduces a novel SAR-based micro-movement analysis method that enables high-resolution 3D imaging of the interior of the Great Pyramid of Giza, revealing previously undiscovered internal structures.

Contribution

The study presents a new imaging technique using micro-movement analysis to achieve interior visualization of solid structures with SAR, overcoming electromagnetic penetration limitations.

Findings

High-resolution 3D internal imaging of the pyramid achieved

Discovered and measured previously unknown internal structures

Validated method using COSMO-SkyMed satellite data

Abstract

A problem with synthetic aperture radar (SAR) is that, due to the poor penetrating action of electromagnetic waves inside solid bodies, the capability to observe inside distributed targets is precluded. Under these conditions, imaging action is provided only on the surface of distributed targets. The present work describes an imaging method based on the analysis of micro-movements on the Khnum-Khufu Pyramid, which are usually generated by background seismic waves. The results obtained prove to be very promising, as high-resolution full 3D tomographic imaging of the pyramid's interior and subsurface was achieved. Khnum-Khufu becomes transparent like a crystal when observed in the micro-movement domain. Based on this novelty, we have completely reconstructed internal objects, observing and measuring structures that have never been discovered before. The experimental results are estimated by processing series of SAR images from the second-generation Italian COSMO-SkyMed satellite system, demonstrating the effectiveness of the proposed method.