Experimental study on laser cleaning of pollutants on the surface of ceramic relics

Cleaning of naturally formed pollutants and man-made adhesive materials on the surface of ceramic cultural relics is very important to the restoration and protection of ceramic cultural relics. With the rapid development of laser technology, laser cleaning has been successfully applied in the field of cultural relics cleaning due to its advantages of selectivity, controllability and high stability in the past two decades. In this manuscript, laser cleaning of virous pollutants on the surface of ceramic relics using a nanosecond fiber laser has been investigated experimentally. Cleaning parameters such as laser power, scanning speed and cleaning time have been changed to optimize the cleaning effect with different pollutants. The components of pollutants were analyzed by fluorescence spectrometer, while the morphologic changes of samples before and after cleaning were observed by a confocal microscope. The optimal cleaning parameters are obtained with virous pollutants respectively and it can provide effective support to the protection of ceramic relics.