Measuring acidity in paper

Mary Miller <memiller<-a t->umn< . >edu> writes

>I received an inquiry from a student in our Art Department.  He is
>working on a project to plant pulp fiction novels under plants. He's
>interested in measuring the levels of acidity of the paper in the
>books, so that he can find plants with similar amounts of acidity in
>their soil (I assume that's part of the art project).  At the risk
>of exposing my scientific naivete, is there feasible way for him to
>measure the pH levels of paper in a book?

This publication by the Canadian Conservation Institute
might be useful.  It weighs up the various methods of pH
testing for media commonly found in museum collections:

    <URL:http://www.cci-icc.gc.ca/resources-ressources/publications/category-categorie-eng.aspx?id=18&thispubid=514>

Leah Warriner-Wood
Conservator, WHConservation.com


                                  ***
                  Conservation DistList Instance 28:23
                Distributed: Thursday, November 6, 2014
                       Message Id: cdl-28-23-010
                                  ***