A good story, Boulder scientist shares Shroud of Turin research, by Amy Bounds appears in the Denver Post:

clip_image001Rudolph Dichtl’s expertise on the famed Shroud of Turin includes not just extensive research into its history, but also firsthand experience testing the cloth itself.

Dichtl, a retired physicist who lives in Boulder, was a founding member of a contingent of scientists granted unprecedented access to the shroud in 1978 in Turin, Italy. They worked around the clock for five days to run tests and gather evidence.

Sunday, he gave a talk  . . .

On the bloodstains and the image:

The 30-person Shroud of Turin Research Project ultimately concluded the apparent bloodstains were real and very old. They also found no evidence of paint, dye, stains or any known artist’s media that could have created the discolorations that form the image.

Dichtl said there’s no way to prove that the shroud was the burial cloth of Jesus. But, he said, based on the evidence, “I believe it’s possible.”

On the carbon dating:

However, Ray Rogers, a member of the research project and Los Alamos National Laboratory fellow until his death in 2005, found in 2004 that the test sample used for the carbon dating was taken from a rewoven area — skillfully mended with different materials — that was virtually invisible under normal lighting conditions.

Rogers used ultraviolet photography and a battery of chemical tests to conclude that the tested section was this medieval patch and that the carbon dating, while correct, didn’t apply to most of the shroud.

“The consensus is the Carbon 14 dating has to be redone,” Dichtl said.