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<p style="margin-top:0;margin-bottom:0">Hi, Katie, </p>
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<p style="margin-top:0;margin-bottom:0">This is what EDA was made for. The machine you need is an SEM with EDA (Energy Dispersive Analysis). That will give you a spectrum that identifies the elements present in the blue stain. In particular, you need an Environmental
SEM. These use a partial pressure of nitrogen in place of carbon coating the specimen. Obviously for these fossils, you don't want to carbon coat them. </p>
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<p style="margin-top:0;margin-bottom:0">I would start with the shards that don't have fossils. 15 kV is a good place to start for accelerating voltage. That covers the excitation energy for most of the periodic chart. With this color blue, I suspect that copper
is involved. But there are so many different transition metals that could contribute, you really need to measure and not guess. </p>
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<p style="margin-top:0;margin-bottom:0">Once you have a chemical analysis, then you can start to investigate proper means to curate the material. </p>
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<p style="margin-top:0;margin-bottom:0">Feel free to contact me to discuss it if you like. </p>
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<p style="margin-top:0;margin-bottom:0">Cheers,</p>
<p style="margin-top:0;margin-bottom:0">Chris </p>
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<div class="PlainText">Chris Tacker, Ph.D., P.G., Research Curator, Geology<br>
North Carolina Museum of Natural Sciences http://www.naturalsciences.org/<br>
11 West Jones Street<br>
Raleigh, NC 27601-1029<br>
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Please note:<br>
E-mail and phone have both changed:<br>
christopher.tacker@naturalsciences.org<span style="font-family:Tahoma"> 919-707-9941.</span><br>
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<span style="font-family:Tahoma">E-mail correspondence to and from this address may be subject to the North</span><br style="font-family:Tahoma">
<span style="font-family:Tahoma">Carolina Public Records Law and may be disclosed to third parties.</span></font></i><br>
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<div id="divRplyFwdMsg" dir="ltr"><font face="Calibri, sans-serif" style="font-size:11pt" color="#000000"><b>From:</b> Nhcoll-l <nhcoll-l-bounces@mailman.yale.edu> on behalf of Katie McEvoy <katieimcevoy@gmail.com><br>
<b>Sent:</b> Thursday, October 11, 2018 2:07:36 PM<br>
<b>To:</b> nhcoll-l@mailman.yale.edu<br>
<b>Subject:</b> [External] [Nhcoll-l] Blue Matrices</font>
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<div dir="ltr">Recently the museum I work at received a donation of fossils with matrices that have turned blue . The donor has said that they were stored in a dark, dry basement in paper towel/plain newsprint and were not treated with anything. Some of it
looks like accretion while some of it appears to be the matrix itself and they do not fluoresce under short or long wave UV light.
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<div>Has anyone seen this before or know what may have caused it?</div>
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<div>Pictures attached.</div>
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