SECURE-COATS

The project aims at providing new solutions for the conservation of marble and limestone in cultural heritage, by creating composite coatings with:

– ANTI-FOULING ABILITY, to prevent biodeterioration caused by microorganisms;
– ANTI-STAIN ABILITY, to prevent staining by green malachite stripes that form when stone is coupled with bronze;
– SELF-DIAGNOSTIC ABILITY, to evaluate quickly and non-destructively whether a protective coating is still present after years of field exposure.

To reach the project goals, the coating should be:

– SAFE: Safe-by-design” approaches will be adopted for the coating development, with the aim of controlling their possible cytotoxicity.
– ECO-FRIENDLY: The new coatings developed within the project will have lower environmental impact than commercial alternatives, as will be specifically assessed by life cycle assessment (LCA).
– DURABLE: The durability of the new coatings will be experimentally tested through ageing tests, designed to reproduce in an accelerated but still reliable way the natural weathering processes.

To achieve these abilities, possibly combined in a single multifunctional treatment, several different strategies will be investigated. The project will take advantage of the interdisciplinary and complementary competences of two research units involved in the project.