ARTS AND HUMANITIES RESEARCH COUNCIL
More than £6.5 million has been awarded to 16 projects under the Science and Heritage Programme. Funded jointly by the AHRC and the Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council, these awards seek to ensure that knowledge and innovation in cultural-heritage research is strengthened, while also helping early career researchers to emerge as leaders in the field.
LARGE RESEARCH GRANTS (SCIENCE AND HERITAGE) SCHEME
Award winner: D. D'Ayala
Institution: University of Bath
Value: £531,289
Studentship: £146,887
Parnassus - ensuring integrity, preserving significance: value-based flood resilience for protection of cultural heritage from climate-change impact
Award winner: A. Cohn
Institution: University of Leeds
Value: £534,833
Studentship: £146,887
The detection of archaeological residues using remote-sensing techniques (DART)
Award winner: H. Liang
Institution: Nottingham Trent University
Value: £661,419
The next generation of optical coherence tomography (OCT) for art conservation - in situ non-invasive imaging of subsurface microstructure of objects
Award winner: P.G. Lindley
Institution: University of Leicester
Value: £497,907
Studentship: £152,397
Representing re-formation: reconstructing Renaissance monuments
Award winner: M. Strlic
Institution: University College London
Value: £610,710
"Collections demography": on dynamic evolution of populations of objects
Award winner: D.E. Watkinson
Institution: Cardiff University
Value: £364,470
Studentship: £48,747
Evidence-based condition-monitoring strategy for preservation of heritage iron
SCIENCE AND HERITAGE POSTDOCTORAL FELLOWSHIPS SCHEME
Award winner: T. Agbota
Institution: University College London
Value: £241,433
Accessible heritage - remote transcontinental heritage-support system
Award winner: L. Gonzalez
Institution: The National Archives
Value: £234,438
From structural change to perceived damage: appropriate environmental conditions for parchment
Award winner: G.K.C. Jones
Institution: University of Warwick
Value: £254,162
Advancing and communicating synchrotron techniques for heritage-metals conservation
Award winner: N. Luxford
Institution: University College London
Value: £235,531
Change or damage? Effect of climate on decorative furniture surfaces in historic properties
Award winner: S. O'Connor
Institution: University of Bradford
Value: £244,324
Cultural objects worked in skeletal hard tissues
Award winner: S. Pandey
Institution: Courtauld Institute of Art
Value: £240,135
Salts and synthetic coatings on wall paintings: characterising their transformation, interaction and contribution to deterioration
Award winner: S. Tanimoto
Institution: Imperial College London
Value: £269,978
Advancing heritage science with spectroscopic imaging
Award winner: G.C. Walker
Institution: University of Reading
Value: £281,055
Seeing through walls: discovering Europe's hidden mural paintings
Award winner: E.A. Willneff
Institution: University of Manchester
Value: £4,584
Interpreting the surface: the application of surface science to artists' acrylic emulsion paint films
IN DETAIL
Award winner: Lorraine Gibson
Institution: University of Strathclyde
Value: £537,123
Studentship: £97,781
Heritage smells!
Funding for this project will go towards the development of olfactory tools for use in heritage science. Equipment will be designed to "sniff" the air, allowing researchers to answer questions regarding the environmental and conservational history of an area, and study the composition, condition or stability of underlying organic materials.
Dr Gibson will work with Catherine Higgitt from the British Museum, Barry Knight from the British Library and Matija Strlic from University College London to extend the study of volatile components in the environment to determine if the "smell" can be used to establish the composition of cultural-heritage objects. It is expected that the research will aid collections custodians and inform decisions about the acquisition, storage, conservation, display and preservation of items.