Australia & Oceania

For the first time, scientists have established a precise construction timeline for colonial-era coral buildings in French Polynesia, using an advanced uranium-thorium (U-Th) dating technique. The findings, published in the journal Antiquity, reveal hidden patterns of architectural development and cultural life in Pacific societies, shedding new light on how local communities adapted to the dramatic changes brought by European contact in the 19th century. Led by Associate Professor James Flexner from the University of Sydney, the study marks the first time U-Th dating has been applied to historical coral architecture. Unlike radiocarbon dating, which is unreliable for materials less than 400 years old, U-Th dating narrows down the date of a coral's death to within just a few years, making