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In recent years, the demand for the protection and restoration of cultural heritage has become increasingly urgent. Particularly for paper-based cultural relics such as ancient books and paintings, their restoration is especially important due to their unique nature and susceptibility to environmental damage. Among various restoration materials, calcium hydroxide (Ca(OH)2) has been widely studied and applied in the protection of paper-based cultural relics. However, commercial Ca(OH)2 materials have issues such as a large particle size and slow carbonation. In order to address these issues, this study employed carboxymethyl cellulose (CMC) as a support, on which nano-sized Ca(OH)2 crystals were grown in situ on its surface, followed by loading with TiO2 nanoparticles, successfully preparing a multifunctional paper-based cultural relic restoration material with reinforcement, deacidification, anti-aging, and antimicrobial properties. It is worth noting that by in situ growing Ca(OH)2 on the surface of CMC, particle size control, uniform dispersion, and the fixation of Ca(OH)2 can be achieved. CMC is used to enhance the mechanical strength of the paper, Ca(OH)2 is used for deacidification, and TiO2 is used for anti-aging and antimicrobial purposes. This study provides a new approach and method for the restoration of paper-based cultural relics, simplifying traditional multi-step processes and avoiding potential impacts on the cultural relics from multiple repairs. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The rise in sea levels, driven by global climate change, poses a significant threat to cultural heritage in coastal regions. Traditional risk assessment methods, focusing on direct inundation, often fail to consider the crucial impact of socio-economic factors, which are significantly vulnerable to sea level rise. To bridge this gap, this study introduces an innovative Sea Level Rise Cultural Heritage Impact Assessment Model (SLR-CHIA Model), a novel approach that integrates both land inundation and socio-economic aspects. This comprehensive model evaluates potential risks to various types of cultural heritage in coastal China, including intangible cultural heritage, relics, and traditional villages. The study's findings are striking: (1) About 7.79% of coastal villages, 53.94% of relics, and 2.53% of intangible cultural heritage are potentially at high risk in a 100-year sea level rise event; (2) Relics in the Eastern coast and villages in the Southern coast are most vulnerable; (3) Different types of cultural heritage rely on diverse principal factors for protection, resulting in varied risk levels under sea level rise conditions. The SLR-CHIA Model provides a vital methodological framework for evaluating cultural heritage risks in other global regions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Contributing to the United Nations 2030 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) within Target 11.4 "Strengthen efforts to protect and safeguard the world's cultural and natural heritage", it is critical to monitor the spatial and temporal stabilities of cultural heritages. The study of the interactive relationship between earthquakes and the protection of cultural heritages needs to be strengthened. On 27 September 2021, the destructive Mw 5.9 Arkalochori earthquake occurred ~25 km away from the city of Heraklion (Greece) where the Heraklion City Wall (HCW), a representative cultural heritage of Greece and Europe, was located. This offered a proper case to investigate the shortcomings aforementioned. Here, we intend to set up and answer the following three questions (Whether, Where and What, 3Ws): Whether there were impacts on the HCW caused by the Arkalochori earthquake? Where did the maximum deformation occur? What was the relationship between seismic deformation between the epicenter and the HCW over time? We performed two-dimensional (2D) InSAR measurements for both co-seismic and post-seismic deformations using the ascending and descending Sentinel-1A SAR images. The spatial-temporal characteristics of Up–Down (UD) and East–West (EW) were revealed. The 2D co-seismic deformation field showed that the near-filed deformations were dominating compared with the deformations at the HCW, the UD deformation was mainly featured with subsidence with a maximum value of ~21 cm, the EW deformation was ~9 cm westward and ~10 cm eastward. The time-series measurements showed that: (1) temporally, the HCW responded quickly to the Arkalochori earthquake, and the accumulative deformations at the seven different bastions of the HCW showed the same trend as the near-field area over time. (2) Spatially, the closer to the Mw 5.9 epicenter, the larger the deformations that occurred. (3) The EW and UD deformation trends of the HCW that were consistent with the Mw 5.9 epicenter were interrupted at the middle time spot (22 January 2022), indicating the influence of another earthquake sequence consisting of eight earthquakes with magnitudes larger than 3.5 that happened on 16–18 January 2022. Respectively, to summarize and address the aforementioned 3Ws based on the post-seismic analysis accomplished by the MSBAS method, the Arkalochori earthquake did affect the HCW; besides, the influences of the ~13 km earthquake sequence were also detected; the nearest part to the epicenter suffered the most; the deformation trends of the HCW were approximately the same with the epicenter area of the Arkalochori earthquake both in the UD and EW directions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

There are still many difficulties in the recovery and long-term preservation of underwater archaeological artifacts, in situ preservation should be the first choice before further procedures are considered. However, the materials, preservation status, and preservation environment of underwater artifacts are diverse, resulting in many fragile artifacts facing difficult situations. In order to prevent serious damage, it is a safe protective strategy to preserve them in a controlled environment for a long time after excavation. Extraction and transfer of fragile cultural relics are vital parts of this strategy. Due to the complexity of the underwater environment and the vulnerability of fragile artifacts, safety in extraction and transfer still faces enormous challenges. Researchers have developed new materials and technologies to tackle this problem. This paper focuses on introducing and developing prospects to different preservation techniques for fragile artifacts from underwater sites. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Acta Universitatis Lodziensis: Folia Archaeologica is the property of Wydawnictwo Uniwersytetu Lodzkiego and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Different cultural backgrounds give birth to distinct styles of cultural heritage. In order to explore the relationship between the cultural relics' materials and the specific cultural attributes, a new method for the recognition of cultural relics' image materials based on computer vision and attention mechanism is proposed. Moreover, this paper analyzes the relationship between Chinese traditional cultural relics and Chinese dynasties as an example. The methodology of this work consists first of using Python to collect and manually screen cultural relic images of common material types. Then, the nine datasets with different materials are uploaded to the EfficientNet-B0 network with the attention mechanism for iterative training. The best weight model is stored and put to the test. Finally, the improved EfficientNet-B0 network is applied to recognize the cultural relics image datasets of each dynasty, and the relationship between the materials and the cultural attributes of each dynasty is analyzed. As for the outcomes, the experimental results show that the EfficientNet-B0 model, with the attention mechanism, can effectively enhance the extraction of image material information, and the accuracy of the recognized cultural relics image materials reaches up to 88.15%, with an average precision of 83.3%. The comparison experiment on the material dataset shows that the proposed method has excellent ability in the recognition of material image compared with other common image recognition methods. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Sanxingdui Ruins site, situated in Sichuan Province, China, constitutes a significant component of the ancient Shu culture. Confronted with the challenge of excavating and analyzing cultural relics, this study introduces hyperspectral methods for the first time, utilizing the cultural relics unearthed from sacrificial pits. It proposes a novel algorithm for the extraction and analysis of Sanxingdui cultural relics, while also establishing a comprehensive data acquisition and analysis system. The specific innovations of this research are as follows: 1) Acquiring spectral curves of representative materials such as ivory, jade, bronze, and stone pillars, and constructing a spectral database. 2) Introducing the Dual-encoder UNet (D-Unet) model from a spatial perspective to achieve preliminary extraction of cultural relics. 3) Proposing an unsupervised Fuzzy C-means (FCM) algorithm from a spectral perspective to analyze the material properties of cultural relics. Experimental results demonstrate that the proposed algorithm successfully achieves the extraction and analysis of Sanxingdui cultural relics. Ablation experiments further reveal that the algorithm yields excellent results in scenarios involving exposed cultural relics, semi-exposed cultural relics on the ground, and typical cultural relics. Moreover, the algorithm can be extended to other aspects of archeological excavation and analysis. During the experiment, it was observed that: 1) The cultural relics' surfaces contain distinctive substances, tentatively identified as proteins, suggesting the presence of textile capabilities in the ancient Shu civilization. 2) An unearthed bronze mask exhibits structural asymmetry, contrasting with other highly refined artifacts. Through intelligent synthesis technology analysis, a totem-like target was discovered at the center of the eyebrow, potentially associated with the veneration of eyes in Sanxingdui cultural relics, thereby providing additional validation of the algorithms effectiveness. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Technical Transactions / Czasopismo Techniczne is the property of Sciendo and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

In 1463, construction was underway on the Fatih Mosque in Istanbul by Sultan Mehmet II. According to one of the Sultan's ambassadors, the Mosque was located "in the best site of the city." The site of the new mosque was the Church of the Holy Apostles, which had served as a site of Byzantine imperial ceremony. While the circumstances of its destruction remain murky, Israel argues that the demolition of the church was subsumed into the rhetoric of conflict as Mehmet conquered Venetian territory along the Adriatic, and as Pope Pius II tried to stir enthusiasm for a crusade. Against this backdrop of political strife, this article explores the reproduction and redefinition of the Church of the Holy Apostles through traces of its relics and architectural forms as the Republic again redefined their relationship with the Byzantine Empire, claiming inheritance over its patrimony. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Museum cultural relics represent a special material cultural heritage, and modern interpretations of them are needed in current society. Based on the catalogue data of cultural relics published by the State Administration of Cultural Heritage, this paper analyzes the continuity and intermittentness of cultural relics in time series by using the method of continuity judgment of cultural relics, analyzes the aggregation and migration of cultural relics in space by using the method of spatial analysis, and then uses cosine similarity to explain the similarity distribution in space and time. The results show that the overall distribution of cultural relics exhibits the characteristics of class aggregation, dynasty aggregation and regional aggregation. From the perspective of a time scale, cultural relics have different "life cycles", displaying continuity, intermittentness, and similarity. From the perspective of a spatial scale, the cultural relic distribution forms a small "cultural communication circle", showing aggregation, migration, and similarity. The temporal and spatial distribution of cultural relics exhibited more similar characteristics among dynasties that were closer together than those that were far away. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]