Analytical Sciences

Identification of Proteinaceous Binders in Ancient Tripitaka by the Use of an Enzyme-linked Immunosorbent Assay

Yi LIU,* Yi LI,* Runxing CHANG,* Hailing ZHENG,** Menglu LI,*** Zhiwen HU,*** Yang ZHOU,** and Bing WANG*

*Key Laboratory of Advanced Textile Materials and Manufacturing Technology, Ministry of Education, Zhejiang Sci-Tech University, Hangzhou 310018, China
**Key Scientific Research Base of Textile Conservation, State Administration for Cultural Heritage, China National Silk Museum, Hangzhou 310002, China
***Institute of Textile Conservation, Zhejiang Sci-Tech University, Hangzhou 310018, China

Proteinaceous materials, such as ovabumin and collagen, were commonly used as binding media, and as adhesives and protective coatings. However, the identification of ancient proteinaceous binders is a great challenge for archaeologists, due to their limited sample size, complex combinations of various ingredients and reduced availability of the binder during the process of protein degradation. In this paper, an enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA) provides to be a particularly promising method for the detection of proteinaceous binding materials in ancient relics. The present work focused on the specific identification of proteins in archaeological binders, which was brushed on the Tripitaka. Two samples, the adhesion area (S1) and the ink area (S2), were tested by ELISA. The results showed that both S1 and S2 reacted positively when treated with an anti-collagen-I antibody. It proved the existence of proteinaceous binders in Ancient Tripitaka, and the percentage of collagen in S1 and S2 was 61.44 and 15.4%, respectively. Compared with other conventional techniques, ELISA has advantages of high specificity, sensitivity, rapidity and low cost, making it especially suitable for the protein detection in the archaeological field.

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