Anoxia

Description

A condition in which oxygen deprivation results in damage or death. Anoxia treatment are used in conservation to kill insects. To produce an oxygen free environment, an air-tight case must be created, usually with a vapor barrier film, such as Marvelseal® 360. Then the sealed environment is purged with a non-oxygen gas, such as Argon or Nitrogen and oxygen scavenger tablets, such as Ageless®, are added to maintain the low oxygen concentrations. When oxygen levels are kept at or below 0.1%, all life stages of ten commonly found museum insects can be killed in ten days (Daniel et al 1993).

Synonyms and Related Terms

anoxic; anoxia (Esp.); hypoxia (Eng., Dan., Esp., Ned.); Hypoxie (Deut., Fr.); anoxie (Fr.);

Resources and Citations

• M.Gilberg, "Inert Atmosphere Disinfestation of Museum Objects using Ageless Oxygen Scavenger", ICOM preprints, 9th Annual Meeting, Dresden, 1990, 812-816.

• N.Valentin, F.Preusser, "Insect Control by Inert Gases in Museums, Archives and Libraries" Restaurator 11:22-23, 1990.

• V.Daniel, G. Hanlon, S.Mekawa, "Eradication of Insect Pests in Museums Using Nitrogen" WAAC Newsletter, Vol. 15 (3), Sept. 1993, 15-19.

• A Glossary of Paper Conservation Terms, Margaret Ellis (ed.), Conservation Center of the Institute of Fine Arts, New York City, 1998

• Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anoxia (Accessed Mar. 20, 2006) -for non-English terms