Pollen, key to the origin of sunken ships

2004/03/01 Elhuyar Zientzia Iturria: Elhuyar aldizkaria

• Botanika

They discover that pollen discovered in the wood of sunken ships can help determine where the ship was built. In fact, the resin used in the packaging construction captures pollen grains from the surrounding plants. These pollen grains identify and relate the corresponding plant to the geographic medium of growth.

Researchers often have large tasks to know where the sunken ships were built. The observation of the wood used in the construction is often useless as it was brought from outside. But pollen seems a more precise method.

The pollen of each of the plant species is special and researchers can undoubtedly know what kind of vegetation it refers to by taking a pollen grain. Subsequently, they investigate where this plant species was cultivated during the construction of the ship.

This method has been used with the boat Baie de l’Amitié, found in the south of France. It is known that this ship was built two thousand years ago, but they did not know where. The conclusion is that thanks to the pollen stacked in wood has been manufactured in eastern Italy.