In what has been deemed a scientific first, a team led by Dr. Justin Walsh of Chapman University in California and Dr. Alice Gorman of Flinders University in Australia — and aided by some helpful astronauts — has carried out an archeology dig of sorts on the International Space Station, 400 kms above the Earth.

The study involved a space-age version of an age-old archeology technique, the “shovel test pit,” which helps scientists understand the overall characteristics of a dig site quickly through sampling. In the traditional version, a site is mapped with a grid of one-metre squares, some of which are selected for initial excavation to understand the makeup of the entire site.