Saliva

Sanchita Balachandran <sb381 [at] nyu__edu> writes

>I'm interested in finding out "recipes" for synthetic saliva.  I'm
>planning on using this to clean dirt from a marble sculpture.

At present I am trying to understand if there is any practical
application of synthetic saliva in book conservation (does anybody
have any experience?). My concern is on the possible application and
potential dangers in the use of this product. Unfortunately I have
not found much literature on this specific subject. The only
complete reference I have, even if mainly dedicated to painting
restoration, is very interesting:

    Paolo Cremonesi.
    L'uso degli enzimi nella pulitura di opere policrome, il Prato
    ed., Padova (Italy), 1999. ISBN 88-87243-08-5

In this book there is a interesting chapter dedicated to human and
synthetic saliva (with a recipe) that also gives a reference for an
article (that unfortunately I have not yet been able to read):

    O'Hoski, Barbara A.
    An investigation into the composition and properties of saliva in
    relation to the surface cleaning of oil paintings.
    Presented at the Ottawa Regional Group Meeting, December 16, 1976

     **** Moderator's comments: Please respond directly to the
     author. BCIN <URL:http://www.bcin.ca/> shows a couple of dozen
     citations on the subject of saliva

Luca Richard de Bella
Ass. Conservator
Biblioteca Nazionale Universitaria
Torino
Italy


                                  ***
                  Conservation DistList Instance 15:77
                  Distributed: Thursday, May 16, 2002
                       Message Id: cdl-15-77-005
                                  ***