Specific Synchrotron Radiation Facilities Users Community (SpRUC)

Synchrotron radiation was applied to cultural heritage objects in 1987 at the Photon Factory in Japan ahead of the rest of the world. Today, the advanced third-generation synchrotron radiation at SPring-8 is applicable to a wide range of studies in the fields of cultural heritage, archaeology, and arts. Our successful applications include studies on ceramics, glass artifacts, wooden statues, metal artifacts, silk fibers, Japanese lacquer, stones, paintings, and so on. The advanced properties of SR X-rays from SPring-8 enable high energy XRF with 116-keV X-rays, X-ray microbeam (1 μmφ) analysis, and CT with highly collimated parallel 200-keV beams for advanced nondestructive high sensitive three-dimensional X-ray analyses of cultural heritage.

Our "Cultural Property Research Group" aims to promote a fruitful application of synchrotron radiation at SPring-8 to cultural heritage science and produce advanced and international research achievements. In addition to SPring-8, the group will also promote the use of NanoTerasu, SACLA, and Photon Factory, while encouraging complementary use with neutron and muon facilities. Another objective is to contribute to the advancement of research at designated synchrotron radiation facilities by compiling requests and proposals from users in the cultural heritage research community concerning the light sources, beamlines, and methods required for our research field. The details are as follows:

1. We will provide information on the latest experimental techniques and share SR application results in the field of heritage science through our meetings and society activities to increase the number of users and to facilitate communications between the BL scientists and the users. We will also focus on the promotion of the complementary use of neutron and muon with the synchrotron radiation in cultural heritage studies.
2. We supported the events such as "SPring-8 Workshop on Analytical Techniques for Cultural Heritage" from 2015A to 2018B, terms of the Social Interest Proposals. Since the 2020A term, a new review field of Humanities and Social Sciences (HS) has been established for proposals in archaeology and cultural heritage fields. We will continue to support the active use of synchrotron radiation in the field of cultural heritage, archaeology and arts.
3. We will collect the opinions and requests from the users in our field and propose specific performance improvements and methodologies that contribute to the advancement of synchrotron radiation research. We will also provide advice and information regarding responses during the blackout period of the SPring-8-II project.