Papermaking, one of the four major inventions of China, has brought vigorous development to China's economy, science, humanities and other aspects, it records the wisdom crystallization and world events obtained by people in long-term practice, carries the long history of the Chinese nation, and is the witness and carrier of human society and scientific and technological development.
Image source: People's Daily News
According to statistics, there are hundreds of millions of paper cultural relics and archival documents in China, which have immeasurable historical value. Because of the backwardness of cultural relics protection awareness and protection technology, the annual damage rate of paper cultural relics and documents and archives on the mainland is very high, which is really sad.
01 Acidification, the beginning of paper damage
Our commonly used paper is mainly composed of cellulose, and ink, light, sulfur dioxide in the air, mold and other external factors will bring acidic substances, these acidic substances penetrate into the paper will accelerate cellulose hydrolysis, paper yellow and brittle, when serious, a light touch, the paper that records important historical materials may become a piece of debris.
The acidification of paper is continuous and irreversible, as long as there is an acidic factor in the paper fiber, catalytic hydrolysis will continue to occur, the paper structure will be gradually destroyed, and the damage will continue to accumulate. What's more, the acidification of the paper will also be "infected", the acid factor will spread with the moisture in the paper, "infect" other papers, if you have old books on hand, you can observe their pages, is it brittle, as if it is easy to break when touched? In fact, this is the "acid" in the paper.
Compared with traditional handmade paper, the acidification of modern industrial paper is more serious.
At the beginning of the 19th century, with the industrial revolution, paper production has also undergone earth-shaking changes, in order to improve production efficiency, changed its production raw materials and process methods, which led to a great reduction in the life of paper, followed by red cultural relics (cultural relics system), Republic of China documents and newspapers (book system), red and Republic of China archives (archive system) and other paper acidification damage window period.
Taking archives as an example, according to the statistics of the State Archives Bureau, as of the end of 2020, the collection of archives at all levels in the mainland is 917.898 million volumes/piece. However, the traditional manual repair and protection of paper is far from keeping up with the speed of acidification and destruction of paper. Therefore, the R&D and popularization of innovative batch and standardized deacidification technologies are particularly important.
02 How can we prevent paper acidification?
On this point, the Ministry of Culture and Tourism of China has a clear answer in the "14th Five-Year Plan for Cultural and Tourism Science and Technology Innovation", and points out the future research direction of "combating paper acidification": to carry out the research and development of large-scale deacidification equipment for paper literature.
The National Archives Bureau's "14th Five-Year Plan for the Development of the National Archives Undertaking" requires that efforts be intensified in technical aspects such as paper archives acid removal technology and its effect evaluation, and the key national archives in the region are rescued and protected in batches.
03 What is desplucency?
In order to extend the life of the paper, "deacidification" is required. Deacidification is to neutralize the pH of paper through acid-base neutralization. The premise is that there is sufficient deacidification effect and ensure the safety of the paper body and paper information.
With the progress of science and technology and practical exploration, our understanding of the paper acidification mechanism and deacidification process is also deepening, and now the new deacidification technology - "fog run", "seepage" body deacidification technology is gradually breaking through the limitations of the traditional deacidification method, while meeting the paper body, paper information, operators and the environment four safety, its deacidification mechanism is different from the traditional manual soaking spraying technology, with the support of professional equipment and consumables, the work of deacidification can truly achieve portability, standardization, process, batch.
Thanks to the perfect theory and diversified equipment support of the deacidification technology, the application scenarios can cover the system fields such as archives, books, and cultural relics, for various types and specifications of paper collections, and can also help provinces, cities, districts, counties and other related systems (cultural relics systems, library systems, archive systems) units to establish deacidification laboratories or provide a full set of deacidification laboratory custom equipment, in addition to providing integrated deacidification services for each system unit anytime and anywhere.
04 Chinese technology is innovating, and the protection of ancient books is underway
You may think that this technology is still far away from you, but in fact, its application is already very extensive. When you wander through museums, libraries, archives, memorials and other places to feel the historical atmosphere, the well-preserved pages in the glass cabinet may be the credit of this technology.
And this is not only of great significance for the protection of domestic paper collections, but also the protection of cultural relics in countries along the Belt and Road also requires advanced paper deacidification technology for the restoration and protection of cultural relics. In addition, paper deacidification technology will also have a broader space for application in the future, such as important corporate documents, religious documents, private (ancestral) calligraphy and painting collections, etc.
Behind this remarkable technology, there is a condensation of the efforts of many researchers from Zhongcai Technology over the years.
Zhongcai Technology is a national high-tech enterprise dedicated to the research and development and application of paper deacidification theory and technology, the pioneer of the new body deacidification technology of "single-page fog run" and "whole book infiltration", and a national brand with independent intellectual property rights.
The company's independent research and development of a full range of deacidification equipment, combined with the unique calcium deacidizer (different from organic solutions, traditional aqueous solution soaking or spraying), can cover archives, books, cultural relics and other system areas, for various types and specifications of paper collections (archives, ancient books, literature, calligraphy and painting, rubbing, warp scrolls, tickets, etc.) to provide one-stop deacidification services.
Deacidification Laboratory (Image source: Zhongcai Technology)
In line with the "14th Five-Year Plan" of the Ministry of Culture and Tourism, the Bureau of Cultural Relics and the Bureau of Archives, the company is a R&D and production enterprise that can professionally provide comprehensive equipment configuration of the deacidification chamber in China.
In the five thousand years of the yangyang country, from the calligraphy and paintings of successive dynasties to the historical archives of the revolutionary period, the paper carries a large number of historical facts and artistic value. In the process of protecting paper cultural relics and archives, scientific researchers and technicians are undoubtedly "good doctors", doing their best to prolong the life of ancient paper and build a brick by brick of the national memory community.