Isabella del Gaudio

Project Title 

Plastics in Museum Collections - a study of their chemical and physical degradation using a System Dynamics approach.

Background & Summary of Project

Since museums institutions began to be aware of the degradation of museum collections, an interest in understanding degradation mechanisms has developed. Although the decay mechanisms of Cellulose Acetate and Cellulose Nitrate are well established, all the chemical, physical and mechanical decay processes interconnected with each other are still unknown and Isabella will uncover the connection between different degradation processes to provide data to the System Dynamics Model. 

Partners

• Museum of London
• Lacerta Technology

Publications 

Simoní Da Ros, Abil E. Aliev, Isabella del Gaudio, Rose King, Anna Pokorska, Mark Kearney, Katherine Curran, Characterising plasticised cellulose acetate-based historic artefacts by NMR spectroscopy: a new approach for quantifying the degree of substitution and diethyl phthalate contents, Polymer Degradation and Stability (2020)   

Contact

Email: isabella.gaudio.17@ucl.ac.uk
Twitter: @complexplastic
Website: https://www.ucl.ac.uk/bartlett/heritage/research/projects/current-projects/complex