Book nerds, beware.
A new report backed by the American Chemical Society warned that colorfully bound books from the Victorian era are likely packed with toxic dyes, calling on librarians, archivists and researchers to take special precautions when handling these texts.The American Chemical Society is getting the word out on poisonous books from the past.
The findings are thanks to Lipscomb University librarians Jan Cohu and Michaela Rutledge, who asked their colleagues in the chemistry department — with laboratory assistance from Vanderbilt University — to analyze the school’s collection of 19th- and early-20th-century, fabric-covered books. For the first time, researchers applied a process called X-ray diffraction, which has previously been used to test old wallpaper and paintings, to identify which molecules in the pigments contained toxic metals.
Now, all of the colorful 19th-century books at the school’s Beaman Library have been sealed in plastic until more research is done on how to safely handle them, then contribute their results to the Poison Book Project, a crowdsourced research project launched by the Winterthur Museum, Garden & Library in Delaware.
Lifestyle Antiques Books Lead Exposure Lead Poisoning Poison
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