Archaeometry Unit, synchrotron de Daresbury

Application of Synchrotron Radiation for the study of archaeological and cultural heritage (ARCH) material has come of age. Following the seminal paper by Harbottle et al (1986) and the first application by Nakai et al (1991), a steady stream of papers has since appeared in the literature including milestone papers in Nature (Martinetto et al (1999), Sandstrom et al (2002). The first international workshops on SR-ARCH at Daresbury (1999) and Stanford (2000) opened up the field to the wider SR community, worldwide. Since then, the "SR mountain" has been climbed up and down, from the infrared (De Ryck et al (2004), Salvado et al (2004)) to the very hard X-rays (Nakai et al (2001), Molera et al (2004)) with intermediate "hills" in the SR spectrum signposted by Tang et al (2001), Wess et al (2001), Bertrand et al (2003), Salvado et al (2002), Smith et al (2003), Padovani et al (2003), Poolton et al (2003), Mueller et al (2004), Gliozzo et al (2004) and many others exploiting many (but not all) SR modalities: FTIR, L- and K-edge XAS, SAXS, XRF, surface and powder XRD and imaging micro-XRD/XRF/XAS/SAXS. The target material has varied from soft tissues and textile fibres to pigments, ceramics, glazes, bone, wood, metal and even intact museum objects studied non-destructively.As the number of practitioners and experience with the ergonomics of working in a competitive and time-pressured environment increases, it is time to take stock and reassess the impact of SR on ARCH in the future. Should ARCH research proposals be submitted to SR centres as "curiosity research" with "human interest" value or should this well-earned foothold be accepted as having a proper role to play in the wealth creation – wealth preservation cycle?There are several ways forward for consolidating progress in this area:

1. Establish a firm base at synchrotron sites with bridges to museum and archaeological science laboratories. The example set by the SOLEIL-LOUVRE project is to be applauded, encouraged and emulated.

2. Incorporate ARCH science as a legitimate and permanent research activity in the research programme of these sites. Already new sources in the design phase (SOLEIL, BOOMERANG, CLS, SESAME) have included ARCH in their research portfolio with more than a dozen other SR sources having been "invaded" by marauding archaeologists, spearheaded by their physical scientist associates.

3. Strive for real experiments, not only static measurements, e.g., time-resolved experiments (where time represents a process parameter such as temperature, environmental factors in aging & corrosion) and reproduction of ancient technology under controlled conditions.

4. Exploit existing synergies between SR and other "cutting-edge" materials science technology, e.g., neutron diffraction and associated modalities, affordable by and available only at international centres of scientific and technical excellence.