Biodeterioration of Cultural Heritage in Italy: State of Art

The problem of deterioration of works of art is particularly relevant in Countries like Italy that are rich in Cultural Heritage. In fact, following UNESCO data, in Italy are located 2/3 of the Cultural Heritage known in the World. Archeological areas, statues, buildings, museums, churches and items there located, hypogean environments, are subjected to different stresses due the geographical position, different degree of pollution, great variety of typology of materials and consequent status of conservation. All together these factors contribute to the different modality of biological attack. Biodeterioration can be defined as the irreversible loss of value and/or information of an object of art following the attack by living organisms (Urzì and Krumbein, 1994). Biodeterioration of stone monuments is one of the principal field of interest of Italian researchers. However, other groups are also concerned with the biodeterioration of other materials as books, glass, wood textile and other materials.