Amy Marquardt: Preserving Silver Artifacts

Amy, a Ph.D. candidate in the Department of Materials Science and Engineering at University of Maryland, created this video for a Thinkable competition. In it, she explains in a non-technical way how she is is creating and applying ceramic films to silver artifacts to protect them from tarnish. The virtually invisible films are applied using atomic later deposition (ALD) and are only nanometers thick. Amy's technique protects silver for up to 15 times longer than the plastic coatings currently used by museums.