https://doi.org/10.1140/epjp/s13360-020-00635-x
Regular Article
Comparison of the performance of two handheld XRF instruments in the study of Roman tesserae from Cástulo (Linares, Spain)
1
HERCULES Laboratory, University of Évora, Palácio do Vimioso, Largo Marquês de Marialva 8, 7000-809, Évora, Portugal
2
Archaeometry Research Group, Department of Archaeology, Ghent University, Sint- Pietersnieuwstraat 35, 9000, Ghent, Belgium
3
Raman Spectroscopy Research Group, Department of Chemistry, Ghent University, Krijgslaan 281, S12, 9000, Ghent, Belgium
4
X-ray Micro-spectroscopy and Imaging Research Group, Department of Chemistry, Ghent University, Krijgslaan 281, S12, 9000, Ghent, Belgium
5
University Research Institute for Iberian Archaeology, University of Jaén, Building C6, 23071, Jaén, Spain
6
Department of Physical and Analytical Chemistry, University of Jaén, Building B2, 23071, Jaén, Spain
7
Department of Geosciences, School of Science and Technology, University of Évora, Colégio Luís António Verney, R. Romão Ramalho, 59, 7000-671, Évora, Portugal
n peter.vandenabeele@ugent.be, raman@ugent.be
Received:
28
May
2020
Accepted:
27
July
2020
Published online:
11
August
2020
Cultural Heritage objects are frequently unavailable for transportation to laboratory facilities due to their size, location or local Cultural Heritage preservation regulations. The development of handheld XRF (hXRF) systems has, therefore, proven to be essential in the study of unmovable objects. In this study, two handheld XRF instruments—Bruker™ Tracer III SD® and Olympus™ Innov-X Delta Premium—were compared and evaluated using tesserae from the Mosaico de los Amores (Linares, Spain). Given their portability, the user-friendly nature of their operating systems and their overall performance, both hXRF instruments are highly recommended for in situ campaigns in Cultural Heritage studies. However, the detection limits calculated for each element point towards a better detection of low-Z elements when using the two-beam mode of the Olympus™ Innov-X Delta Premium hXRF. This study underlines the importance of systems that allow the analysis of the same point with analytical conditions optimized for different chemical elements.
Electronic supplementary material The online version of this article (https://doi.org/10.1140/epjp/s13360-020-00635-x) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users.
© Società Italiana di Fisica and Springer-Verlag GmbH Germany, part of Springer Nature 2020
