Pulsed laser cleaning (PLC) applied to samples in cultural heritage field

Abstract

The pulsed laser cleaning (PLC) technique employing different laser wavelengths, with a ns pulse duration, is presented. Such a technique can be applied to the preservation of cultural heritage artworks on different materials, like metals, ceramics and glasses to clean the surfaces of debris accumulated over the years, to remove the oxidation layers, the dust, the organic materials and other unwanted layers, restoring their original composition and shape. PLC should be preceded by surface analyses to control the state of the surface before and during the cleaning process, which has to be carefully controlled, in order to stop the cleaning before to damage the underlying original surface. PLC examples, applied to metals, terracotta and glazy ceramics, are presented and discussed using IR, visible and UV pulsed laser irradiations at low intensity.

KEYWORDS:

• Laser ablation
• cultural heritage
• artwork cleaning
• optical properties

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Additional information

Notes on contributors

A. Torrisi

A. Torrisi is a Researcher at the University of Salento, in Puglia, Italy. He works in the field of Physics applied to cultural heritage and materials science.

L. Torrisi

L. Torrisi is a full Professor of Physics, working at the University of Messina, Italy. He works in the field of laser-matter interaction and on plasmas science. This paper shows a collaboration activity between the two Italian researchers.