More than 45 million people have voted so far in an Internet campaign to choose the seven "new" wonders of the world out of 21 short listed historical buildings or monuments.

The contest, aimed at raising global awareness about the world's shared cultural heritage, was set up by Swiss filmmaker, curator and traveller Bernard Weber, following the destruction of Afghanistan's giant Buddha statues at Bamiyan by the Taliban in 2001

In the most recent count the top 10 were the Acropolis in Greece, the ancient Mayan city of Chichen Itza in Mexico, the Coliseum in Rome, the Eiffel tower in Paris, the Great Wall of China, the Incan ruins of Machu Picchu, Petra in Jordan, the statues on Easter Island, Britain's Stonehenge and the Taj Mahal in India...

"I am against this [contest] totally. I cannot accept a Greek historian choosing the seven wonders of antiquity and have a tourist company choosing the new ones," Hawass said...

45 million vote for updated world wonders, People's Daily, China, May 24, 2007.

University of Alabama at Birmingham (UAB) Egyptologist Sarah Parcak, Ph.D., is in a race against time. In Egypt, thousands of known and unknown archaeological sites are at risk of destruction from urban sprawl, expanding development and looting. Twenty-three percent of ancient sites in the East Delta region alone have disappeared in the past 30 years, with 8 percent lying under towns and 76 percent undergoing full to partial removal. Should the same rate of site destruction continue and increase, by 2050, virtually all archaeological sites, or tells, could be wiped out in the region.

"Only 1/100th of one percent of archaeological sites in Egypt have been discovered, Parcak said. "Our entire understanding of Egyptian history is based on these few discoveries. What we [Egyptologists] have discovered so far is just the tip of the iceberg."

Parcak is using satellite imagery to find and identify tells. The technology allows her to find tells in just weeks instead of years. She became the first Egyptologist to use the methodology in 2003-2004, when she located 132 sites, some dating as far back at 3,000 B.C. Among the sites she located [are]...

Middle Egypt Survey Project

Scientist Races to Save Ancient Egypt, University of Alabama at Birmingham via YubaNet.com, USA, May 24, 2007.

cf. Scientist Races to Save Ancient Egypt, University of Alabama at Birmingham via Newswise, USA, May 24, 2007.

cf. Scientist Races to Save Ancient Egypt, University of Alabama at Birmingham, Alabama, USA, May 23, 2007.

cf. Sarah Parcak, Satellites and survey in Middle Egypt, Egyptian Archaeology, Egypt Exploration Society, UK, No. 27, Autumn 2005.

Previously:

Bangor native finds career in Egyptian tombs, April 04, 2006.

Satellite technology used at Amarna, February 14, 2006.

The county's favourite mummy is getting another CT scan.

And starting Monday, visitors will be able to get a glimpse of Pahat, the Berkshire Museum's 2,000-year-old iconic artefact, as it undergoes the conservation process to prepare him for a trip to the hospital.

"It's just to see what's inside him and to learn more about him," said museum spokeswoman Sherrill Ingalls.

Conservator Dena Çirpili of Objects Conservation Services in Buffalo, N.Y., will spend most of next week working on the preparation in a roped-off area visible to the public.

Pahat's CT scan — a high-tech X-ray imaging process — is scheduled for Monday, June 4 [2007]...

New test, old body, Jenn Smith, The Berkshire Eagle, Massachusetts, USA, May 19, 2007.