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Category: Heritage Science

Close-up view of two hands carefully at work on an aged, yellowing manuscript with handwriting

Assessing the Impact of Sanitizing Products on Collection Items

Posted by: Tana Villafana

This is a guest post by Cindy Connelly Ryan, a Preservation Science Specialist in the Preservation Research and Testing Division. Her research interests include the light sensitivity of inks, dyes and organic colorants, deterioration and stabilization of verdigris and iron gall ink, and historic recipes and working methods for artists’ materials. Over the ever-lengthening months …

Posted in: Care and Handling, Collections Care, Heritage Science, Preservation

Close-up view of two hands carefully at work on an aged, yellowing manuscript with handwriting

But, What Is It? How Research Science Informs Preservation

Posted by: Tana Villafana

I’m a research scientist and I’ve worked in a laser, microscopy, or spectroscopy laboratory (and sometimes a lovely combination of the three) for the past seventeen years. The last five of those years I’ve been lucky to call myself a Chemist at the Library of Congress, working in the optical properties lab of the Preservation …

Posted in: Conservation, Heritage Science, Preservation, Tools of the Trade