Barsoum Gives Lecture on the Cement Pyramid
The debate over whether or not the pyramid builders used a type of limestone cement to construct the pyramids continues. Just in the last couple of weeks a rebuttal of the ‘cement pyramid’ theory by Ioannis Liritzis and his colleagues from the University of the Aegean and the University of Athens has been all over the news.
Now the ball is back in Professor Michael Barsoum’s court. In December 2006 Barsom, professor of materials engineering at Drexel University in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania wrote a paper that was published in the Journal of the American Ceramic Society and also appeared in the scientific magazine Nature vol. 444 supporting previous claims that some of the blocks that make up the pyramids were made from a limestone-based form of concrete.
Professor Michael Barsoum is now preparing to deliver the 2008 Sigma Xi Lecture entitled “The Mystery of the Great Egyptian Pyramids: The role of materials research in suggesting a partial solution”.
From the article in MIT News:
“Barsoum earned his BSc degree in materials engineering from the American University in Cairo in 1977, and an MS from University of Missouri-Rolla in 1980 before getting his PhD in ceramics from the Department of Materials Science and Engineering at MIT. Barsoum’s research into the highly controversial subject of pyramid building stems from his Egyptian heritage and his expertise in ceramic materials science, both of which he has applied to this highly visible research problem. He will discuss recent electron microscopical investigations strongly suggesting that ancient Egyptians had discovered a cement–based on dolomitic lime, diatomaceous silica and disaggregated limestone–that they may have used to cast in place some of the two-ton blocks used to assemble the great pyramids of the Giza plateau more than 4500 years ago. Such a discovery would have been the first monumental use of cementitious material on such a large scale and could have modern implications for low-cost, low-emissions production of building cements made from indigenous materials in our present world.
Sigma Xi, the national scientific research society, was founded in 1886 as an analogue to Phi Beta Kappa in the fields of science and engineering research. Its 100,000 members are affiliated with 500 chapters and clubs throughout the world. The MIT chapter is the organization’s largest and annually elects new members from the undergraduate and graduate student bodies and the Institute’s faculty and research staff. Each year, the chapter honors an outstanding academic researcher with MIT connections who has made important recent contributions to a scientific research field.”
Read the story in full: In Sigma Xi lecture, Barsoum to focus on pyramids
You can watch Barsoum’s 2007 Engineering New Frontiers Lecture online. Duration: 1 hour and 20 minutes. If you don’t have Microsoft’s Silverlight installed you’ll be prompted to install it. There are occasional problems with the speaker’s microphone around 10 minutes in but sound returns soon after.
