NASA Color Trick Was Meant for Mars. Now It's Unveiling Rock Art on Earth
Archaeologist Jon Harman has adapted a NASA image-processing technique, originally designed to analyze Martian landscapes, to reveal hidden details in ancient rock art. The 'decorrelation stretch' algorithm enhances color contrast, allowing researchers to identify faded or obscured figures in historical artifacts.
Why it matters
This demonstrates the practical, cross-disciplinary application of space-exploration technology to cultural heritage preservation.
In 2005, archaeologist Jon Harman was attending a conference on rock art when he came across an unexpected source of inspiration: images of Mars. One showed the planet’s familiar rusty-red surface; another, created using a method developed at NASA, transformed the Martian landscape into a striking mosaic of red, green, and yellow, revealing remarkable detail. Harman immediately saw how the technique could help researchers study some of the world’s oldest paintings.
The technique, known as decorrelation stretch, is used to enhance contrasts in digital imagery. It was first developed by researchers at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) in 1978 to improve the interpretation of high-correlation remote sensing and satellite imagery.
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