Radiocarbon dating is a method that provides objective age estimates for carbon-based materials that originated from living organisms. An age could be estimated by measuring the amount of carbon-14 present in the sample and comparing this against an internationally used reference standard.

What range of dates is carbon-14 dating best used for?

Until now, radiocarbon results typically gave a best date in the low 1600s BC, about 100 years older than given by most archaeological assessments.

How does AMS radiocarbon dating work?

AMS dating involves accelerating the ions to extraordinarily high kinetic energies followed by mass analysis. Although more expensive than radiometric dating, AMS dating has higher precision and needs small sample sizes.