Room temperature corrosion of museum glass: an investigation using low-energy SIMS

Glass is often regarded as a stable durable material and the wide range of contemporary applications of glass reinforces this belief. There is nothing inherent in the glassy state, however, that confers stability, and the problem of glass corrosion has been well documented since the 17th century. Glass corrosion still affects commercial float glass production and glasses used to contain high level nuclear waste, but one area in particular where glass corrosion is very common is in the museum environment. In order to conserve these artefacts it is essential to understand fully both the composition of the corroded glass and the corrosion mechanism. In this study, the application of low-energy SIMS for the depth profiling of corroded glass is studied with the aim of finding a suitable environment for the safe storage of glass objects in a museum. (C) 2004 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.