Turkey completes detailed scan of Hagia Sophia

The Turkish ministry of culture and tourism completed a digital scan of Hagia Sophia in Instanbul to create its perfect "digital twin," as part of a program to produce a record of the monument, Turkish state broadcaster TRT Haber reported on Thursday.

The project started in 2022 and included a high-analysis of the 6th century Byzantine monument, using the latest scanning techniques. This has now been stored in a database so that, even if part of the monument collapses in the event of an earthquake or other disaster, it can be rebuilt in precisely the same way, TRT Haber said.

The program also led to the writing of a number of academic papers and books on Hagia Sophia and its construction, which have been added to the database that was created. According to scientists working on the project, this has generated detailed information about the state of the monument, which...