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Physical Sciences and Mathematics Commons

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Chemistry

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Theses and Dissertations

2015

Magnetic Tape

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Full-Text Articles in Physical Sciences and Mathematics

Optical Spectroscopy And Chemometrics For Discrimination Of Dyed Textile Fibers And Magnetic Audio Tapes, Nathan C. Fuenffinger Dec 2015

Optical Spectroscopy And Chemometrics For Discrimination Of Dyed Textile Fibers And Magnetic Audio Tapes, Nathan C. Fuenffinger

Theses and Dissertations

This dissertation focuses on the application of both novel and standard chemometric approaches toward societal problems of interest in the areas of forensic science and cultural heritage preservation. Microspectrophotometry (MSP), a technique enabling measurements of absorption of electromagnetic radiation by microscopic materials in the ultraviolet-visible (UV-Vis) region, is widely used by forensic examiners for comparisons of metameric textile fibers. These comparisons are often hindered, however, by the raw or normalized spectra showing little detail or having few points of comparison. Derivative preprocessing can enhance structure in some instances. We have demonstrated through the use of multivariate statistics that derivatives are …


Spectroscopy And Chemometrics For Cultural Heritage And Forensics: Conservation Of Magnetic Tape By Identifying Degraded Polymer Signatures; And Characterizing The Chemiluminescent Reaction Of Luminol With Blood, Brianna Marie Cassidy Dec 2015

Spectroscopy And Chemometrics For Cultural Heritage And Forensics: Conservation Of Magnetic Tape By Identifying Degraded Polymer Signatures; And Characterizing The Chemiluminescent Reaction Of Luminol With Blood, Brianna Marie Cassidy

Theses and Dissertations

The first half of this manuscript focuses on the identification of degraded magnetic tape using attenuated total reflectance Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy (ATR-FTIR) and multivariate statistics. For several decades before the digital era, magnetic tape was the dominant audio and visual recording medium. A majority of magnetic tapes contain polyester urethane (PEU) binders, which are known to degrade via hydrolysis, making the retrieval of recorded data difficult and at times impossible. Degraded tapes are currently identified through visual inspection followed by playback on vintage equipment. However, if degraded tapes are played, they are likely to stick and shed onto player …