(CNN)In A.D. 79, Mount Vesuvius erupted and buried the cities of Pompeii and Herculaneum. Almost 2,000 years later, researchers may be on the brink of reading some of the charred scrolls damaged in the eruption. The scrolls, which were buried in a Herculaneum library and excavated 260 years ago, are easily damaged or destroyed by unwrapping, so researchers have been unable to read them without risk. But by using X-ray phase contrast tomography -- a 3-D technique used in medicine for soft biological tissue -- they have been able to reveal writing on the tightly wrapped scrolls without unrolling them, wrote a team led by Vito Mocella of the Naples-based Institute for Microelectronics and Microsystems of the National Council of Research.X-ray technique used in medicine helps reveal ancient writingWork on Herculaneum scrolls has promise for scholars
The _ library, which was uncovered in the 1750s, is the only ancient library to survive with its books, the researchers point out.