Virtual unwrapping

Reading a rolled or damaged scroll from a CT scan without opening it.

Herculaneum Papyri and the Vesuvius Challenge

A scroll too fragile to unroll is scanned in three dimensions, the layers of its surface are traced through the scan, and the traced surface is flattened into an image on which the ink can be sought. The Herculaneum Papyri are being read this way, with machine learning finding the carbon ink on carbonised papyrus. The readings are checked by whether independent models find the same letters.

Where it comes up

Herculaneum Papyri and the Vesuvius Challenge

Brent Seales's group at the University of Kentucky proposed reading them by computed tomography and "virtual unwrapping", and proved the idea in 2016 on a charred Hebrew scroll from En-Gedi .

Cite it

Mysteries Department. (2026). Virtual unwrapping [Concept CPT0DECW058H0D6]. https://mysteriesdept.com/r/CPT0DECW058H0D6

@misc{mysteriesdept_cpt0decw058h0d6,
  title     = {Virtual unwrapping},
  author    = {{Mysteries Department}},
  year      = {2026},
  note      = {Concept, catalog key CPT0DECW058H0D6},
  url       = {https://mysteriesdept.com/r/CPT0DECW058H0D6}
}