A recent article has been published in the Virtual Special Issue of the Journal of Cultural Heritage dedicated to LACONA XIII proceedings presenting innovative work of the Photonics for Heritage Science (PhoHS) group at IESL-FORTH.
The paper entitled “Photoacoustic real-time monitoring of UV laser ablation of aged varnish coatings on heritage objects” by Evdoxia Dimitroulaki, George J. Tserevelakis, Kristalia Melessanaki, Giannis Zacharakis and Paraskevi Pouli reflects research performed, primarily, in the framework of IPERION–HS project (H2020- INFRAIA2019–1 under GA No. 871034).

Experiments were conducted with the use of the research infrastructure FIXLAB-1.gr at IESL-FORTH, Heraklion, belonging to the Greek Node of E-RIHS developed and supported partially by the  NSRF 2014-2020 project “HELLAS-CH” (MIS-5002735).
In this study, a novel, non-invasive diagnostic methodology for real-time monitoring of UV laser-assisted varnish removal from heritage objects is introduced. This technique utilizes the acoustic signals generated during the laser ablation process, detected using an air-coupled ultrasonic transducer. Our statistical data analysis approach, based on the cross-correlation of the photoacoustic signals, identifies the critical laser pulse for complete varnish removal. The diagnostic methodology was tested on aged varnish mock-ups on different substrates with promising results, revealing potential applications in controlled laser ablation for heritage surface restoration.

Further info: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.culher.2023.08.006