This thesis is in the first place an “adventure” in three domains of application of Raman spectroscopy as a diagnostic tool for the non-destructive study of cultural heritage materials, namely ancient pottery, porcelains and mosaic glasses. While the use of this technique is well established for the analysis of historic pigments and precious stones, its application to these three types of materials is more recent and still an expanding field. The first chapter illustrates the main objectives of the use of scientific techniques for the analysis of these kinds of materials. It also contains a synthetic review of how Raman spectroscopy has so far been applied to archaeometric studies on cultural heritage materials, and specifically on ancient pottery, porcelains and glasses. The research strategy and the organization of the thesis have been based on this review. Chapter 2 provides a brief introduction to Raman spectroscopy, with its advantages and limitations, as well as a description of the instrumentations and data processing methodologies used. Chapter 3 includes three different experiences regarding the application of Raman spectroscopy to ceramic materials, both in the form of ancient artefacts and of modern test samples. In all cases this technique was combined with other analytical methods, in order to provide information on the raw materials and/or on the production processes of ancient pottery. Chapter 4 constitutes the most voluminous part of this thesis. It deals in general with the potentials of a Raman study of porcelain, and more specifically with the characterization of the 18th century productions of the Bourbon manufactures of Capodimonte and Buen Retiro, through the analysis of both excavation fragments and intact objects belonging to the Sèvres Museum. Raman analyses confirmed the uniqueness of the Capodimonte production, and specific Raman signatures were identified for pastes and glazes, which might serve as a “reference” group for the identification of products issued from this manufacture. High similarities were found with the Raman signatures of some Buen Retiro samples, which would assign them to the early stage of the Spanish production. On the other hand, other Spanish samples belonging to later periods of the same factory display peculiar signatures both in the paste and in the glaze. The acquired data could be further treated, in order also to investigate more deeply the correlations existing between the results of Raman analysis and those obtained from other (destructive) techniques. The data presented in this work will hopefully integrate those relative to a number of other early European productions of porcelain which have so far been published. Such a large corpus of spectroscopic data needs now to be systematized, in order to identify “reference” Raman signatures for each manufacture and possibly to standardize the experimental procedure for Raman analyses on ancient porcelains. Up to now a similar need has been fulfilled for the Raman spectra of pigments, which have been the object not only of many publications, but also of some systematization and implementation over the internet. Hopefully the establishment of such a database and experimental protocol will be the object of more research in the near future. Chapter 5 details the results of a preliminary Raman study carried out on Roman age mosaic glass tesserae, which allowed a good characterization of both the glass matrix and the crystalline inclusions. It also led to the identification in some blue, turquoise and green tesserae of calcium antimoniate, whose Raman signature does not seem to have been recognized so far in the scientific literature on mosaic glasses. Moreover, the extreme homogeneity of the Raman spectra of all the ancient samples well reflected the limited variability of their chemical composition, and gave yet another proof of the high level of standardization of glass production in the Roman Age, through a completely non-destructive analytical approach. These were then the reasons of interest and the main results obtained in the three chosen domains of application of Raman spectroscopy; while dealing with different materials, they are far from being “stranger” to each other. In fact, we deal with colouring agents used as pigments in the decoration layers of ancient pottery and porcelain, as well as in bulk glasses. Also, pottery and porcelain glazes have the same material structure as mosaic glasses, and therefore the treatment of their Raman spectra is exactly the same, and similar kinds of information can be be extracted for glazes and glasses. Needless to say, these three types of materials are often found together in historical and archaeological contexts, or even in the same work of art (such as ancient mosaics, often realized using both ceramic and glass tesserae), and may therefore suffer similar pollution and degradation conditions, or need to be jointly analyzed and restored. Studying such different types of materials actually allowed making some comments on the importance of choosing the “best” Raman instrument for the analysis of each of them. Different spectrometers were used, allowing testing different laser colours, instrumental optics and filters. Macroscopic and microscopic approaches were compared, and a last generation portable Raman spectrometer was used for the on-site analysis of some porcelain museum objects, demonstrating its high-standard performances, fully comparable with those of lab instruments. Generally speaking, this work showed once again the usefulness of Raman spectroscopy for the non-destructive analysis of cultural heritage materials. More particularly, its capability to characterize glassy structures should be underlined. Further results could be obtained by enlarging the set of samples of which both the chemical composition and the Raman spectra be known. This may in fact improve the correlations established in previous works and in the present thesis. This would in turn enhance the reliability of Raman spectroscopy and support its role as a routine technique, both fast and non-invasive, useful for preliminary screenings of large numbers of artefacts. At the same time, it seems important to proceed to a standardization of experimental procedures and data processing methods, in order to facilitate comparisons among results obtained in different labs.

Ce travail expérimental cherche à mieux caractériser les effets du cisaillement sur le vieillissement d'un verre colloidal au niveau microscopique. La dynamique des réarrangements d'un tel système est étudiée au moyen d'une technique de diffusion multiple de la lumière (MSDWS) développée au cours de cette thèse. Nous montrons que la cessation d'un cisaillement de forte amplitude est, au niveau microscopique, l'équivalent pour ces systèmes d'une trempe thermique pour d'autres systèmes vitreux. Notre système est en effet rajeuni par un fort cisaillement puis présente un comportement de vieillissent classique à la cessation de celui-ci. De surcroît, nous montrons qu'un cisaillement de faible amplitude permet au système de vieillir plus vite. Nous appelons ce comportement le survieillissement. Ces deux effets antagonistes (rajeunissement et survieillissement) sont aussi observés sur des polymères vitreux soumis à des marches de température. Nous montrons enfin que le modèle SGR fournit une description unifiée de ces comportements similaires pour différents types de perturbation. Ceux-ci mettent en lumière l'élargissement de la distribution de temps de relaxation au sein de ce type de matériaux soumis à des perturbations extérieures.

Nous avons étudié par spectroscopie de Résonance Paramagnétique Électronique (RPE), par simulation de spectre RPE, par spectroscopie Raman et par photoluminescence les ions Ti3+ formés par irradiation aux β de 3,37 x 10^5 à 1,68 x 10^9 Gy dans les verres SiO2 - Na2O - TiO2 et SiO2 - Al2O3 - B2O3 - Na2O - TiO2. Nous montrons que ces ions existent dans les verres silicatés dans trois sites différents correspondant à trois environnements différents : [VI]Ti3+, [V]Ti3+ sous forme de pyramide à base carrée et peut être sous forme de bi-pyramide. Il existe de même trois sites des ions Ti3+ dans les verres alumino-borosilicatés et le site des ions [VI]Ti3+ est commun aux deux classes de verres. L'étude de l'évolution des proportions d'ions Ti3+ dans chacun des sites ainsi que l'étude des paramètres RPE des sites montre que leur existence est déterminée par la dose intégrée et la valeur du rapport [Na]/[Ti] que nous redéfinissons dans le cas des verres alumino-borosilicatés. Enfin, sous une excitation à 266 nm nous observons à température ambiante une bande d'émission à 500 nm attribuée aux ions Ti4+. Sous une excitation à 532 nm, nous observons une bande d'émission à 590 nm avec des temps de vie courts d'une centaine de ns que nous attribuons soit aux ions Ti3+ soit à des défauts formés près des ions Ti4+. Dans l'ensemble, cette étude montre donc qu'il est possible de contrôler par la chimie et la dose intégrée l'environnement des ions Ti3+ et donc les propriétés d'émission de cet ion dans un verre.

Thèse doctorat : Mécanique : Villeurbanne, INSA : 2003. / Titre provenant de l'écran-titre. Bibliogr. p. 167-172.

Thèse doctorat : Génie Civil : Villeurbanne, INSA : 2003. / Titre provenant de l'écran-titre. Bibliogr. p. 169-174.

Thèse de doctorat : sciences.Génie des matériaux : Ecully, Ecole centrale de Lyon : 2003. Thèse de doctorat : sciences. Génie des matériaux : Faculté des sciences de Sfax : 2003. / 63 réf.

Thèse de doctorat : sciences.Génie des matériaux : Ecully, Ecole centrale de Lyon : 2003. Thèse de doctorat : sciences. Génie des matériaux : Faculté des sciences de Sfax : 2003. / Titre provenant de l'écran titre. 63 réf.

Thèse doctorat : Matériaux : Villeurbanne, INSA : 2005. / Titre provenant de l'écran-titre. Bibliogr. p. 181-189.

Reproduction de : Thèse de doctorat : Sciences : Toulon : 2008. / Titre provenant du cadre-titre. Réf. bibliogr. pp. 5 ; 57-65 ; 117-119 ; 165-167 ; 236-238 ; 242 ; 266.

Thèse de doctorat : Sciences physiques et de l'ingénieur. Lasers et matière et nanosciences : Bordeaux 1 : 2009. / Titre provenant de l'écran-titre.