Analysis of wood anatomy via high-resolution micro-MRI and micro-CT: first approaches and results from Pozzo di Bellafonte (Montaione, Florence, Italy)

Abstract

Several artefacts were found during the excavation performed at “Pozzo di Bellafonte”, located in an archaeological area in the province of Florence (Italy). The material found in the archaeological site included a large amount of wood samples; therefore, a method for understanding the positioning, the shape and the orientation of the wood sample vessels was necessary for identification of botanical taxa. In recent years, the study of ancient remains has benefited greatly from the use of imaging techniques commonly used for medical diagnosis and biomedical research, such as the micro-Computed Tomography (micro-CT) and high-field micro-Magnetic Resonance Imaging (micro-MRI). In this paper such imaging methodologies were employed for assessing the internal structure of representative wood samples extracted from the above mentioned. The complementarity of micro-CT and micro-MRI for the investigation of wood specimen anatomy is also discussed, by underlining what micro-MRI provides as compared with micro-CT and by proposing a tool constituted by the combination of micro-CT/micro-MRI for the study of such wood samples in a multimodal approach.