Abstract
Currently, there are few options for in situ non-destructive monitoring of the stability of modern polymeric materials within heritage collections. Past research has focused on exploiting the infor...
Highlights
There are few options for in situ non-destructive monitoring of the stability of modern polymeric materials within heritage collections
The results have shown that an exposure time of 24 hours is adequate for the capture of volatile organic compounds (VOCs) relating to polymer composition and decay markers (Table 1)
VOCs such as acetic acid and phenol, which relate to decay mechanisms, and the plasticisers diethyl phthalate and dimethyl phthalate, were found at each of the POIs examined, though the concentration levels varied at each location
Summary
There are few options for in situ non-destructive monitoring of the stability of modern polymeric materials within heritage collections. The fundamental shortcoming of many previous studies utilising VOC capture is that often they use destructive analysis, elevated temperatures, artificially aged samples or combinations of these during analysis While these studies have given us a wealth of information regarding decay profiles and key VOCs emitted from specific polymers, they often lack real-world applicability. Previous work by Curran et al (2016) has shown that it is possible to capture relevant VOC data from threedimensional polymer objects at room temperature using solid phase microextraction gas chromatography/mass spectrometry (SPME-GC-MS) This required pre-concentration of VOCs within Tedlar sealable bags, which introduces risks to the object from poor handling during bagging, and severely limits the size of objects which can be studied. The novelty of the method described here lies in using SPME to undertake a systematic and repeated nondestructive and non-invasive monitoring programme of multiple points-of-interest (POI) around a naturally aged three-dimensional polymer object within its normal storage environment
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